


A Practical Poultry Plant 



Southern California 



By CAPTAIN MITCHELL 





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GENKRAt Chart of Grounds for 1000 Hens and a "Home" 



Practical Poultry 
Plant 



SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA 



E. PRYCE MITCHELL 

Master -Mariner 



PUBI,ISHBD BY 

OUT WEST PUBLISHING COMPANY 

Los Angeles, Cal. 

1904 



LIBHARY of CONGRESS 
Two Copies rteceivua 

jUN 3 iyo5 

CBwyriKiu tniry 
cuss ^ XXc. Noi 

/ 7^-0/ 3 7 

COPY B. Z' 



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Copyrig-ht, 1904 



E. PRYCE MITCHELL 
Los Ang-eles, Cal. 



DEDICATED 

TO 

DOUBTING THOMAS" 



PREFACE 

At sea a man is considered to have no time absolutely his own, 
but is liable to be called on at any moment ; he expects this before 
he ships and is therefore prepared for it. 

This same rule applies to the poultry business, so unless one is 
prepared to give up a good deal of his "watch below," Sundays 
included, it were better left alone, for if he gets tired of it in a year 
or so, much of the investm'ent is likely to be lost when selling out. 

In case a reader of this book intends to take it up seriously, and 
requires more information on certain points, the writer will be glad 
to hear from him. 

E. Pryce Mitchell. 
Santa Barbara, California. 



CONTENTS 



CHAPTER I. 
Introductory ......... 9 

CHAPTER H. 
Getting Bearings . 12 

CHAPTER HI. 
Laying Out the Pi.ant . . . . . . . 17 

CHAPTER IV. 

Building and Specifications ..... 22 

CHAPTER V. 
Fencing 40 

CHAPTER VI. 
Hatching ......... 44 

CHAPTER VII. 
The Brooder ......... 51 

CHAPTER VIII. 
The Brood House 57 

CHAPTER IX. 

The Chicken House ....... 62 

CHAPTER X. 
The Hen House 67 

CHAPTER XI. 
The Year's Work 74 

CHAPTER XII. 
Supplies ......... 78 



VIII CONTENTS 

CHAPTER XIII. 
Food Values 82 

CHAPTER XIV. 
The Water Supply ....... 89 

CHAPTER XV. 
Orchard, Garden, Lawn, Etc. ..... 96 

CHAPTER XVI. 
Fancy Stock 99 

CHAPTER XVII. 
Septic Tank 101 

Summary of Expense •. . 105 



A PRACTICAL POULTRY PLANT 



CHAPTER I. 



INTRODUCTORY 

Five years ago I commenced raising chickens for the market ; 
my only experience was some theories that I had worked out during 
some twenty odd years at sea. I had never seen a poultry plant, 
and felt rather cheered up by hearing how several others had failed 
in that particular line of business ; with the courage of ignorance I 
started in, trusting in hard work and common sense to carry me 
through. 

The first year I raised "soft roasters," and found a ready market 
for them at fifty cents each ; people came and bought all I could 
raise, and praised them to my heart's content, as long as I kept the 
price at fifty cents. 

On going over my accounts at the end of the year I found that 
those soft roasters had cost me from fifty-five to sixty cents each to 
raise, and that I had lost $30^ cash on the year's work ; but T had 
found lots of experience. 

The second year I turried everything into Barred Plymouth 
Rocks, keeping the pullets for layers and caponizing the cockerels. 
1 kept the pullets in flocks of sixt}^ and at the end of the year I had 
cleared $250, over the expenses, and added to my experience. 

The third year I invested in a good many settings from the finest 
stock in the country, at five dollars a setting, and added Light 
Brahmas and White Leghorns to my flocks, making three breeds 
in all. I caponized over three hundred birds, and sold nearly all 
the eggs as market eggs. I netted about $500 that year, and began 
to get my bearings, for I learned that the smaller breeds, such as 
Leghorns, can be kept in flocks of from fifty to a hundred and lay 
well, while the heavy birds, like the Brahmas, have to be kept in 
small flocks in order to get the best results. 

Up to this time I had been using only an acre and a half of 
ground, but I now felt safe in adding two acres and a half more, 
making four in all. I also added another breed to my stock, the 



10 A PRACTICAL POULTRY PLANT 

Buff Orpington, and began the fourth year with several fine. yards 
of Barred Plymouth Rocks, Light Brahmas and Buff Orpingtons ; 
also, six hundred. White Leghorn pullets, just beginning to lay. 

I began to advertise settings of fifteen eggs at $2 per setting, 
and sold a fair amount ; all the surplus eggs went to market. I also 
caponized over four hundred cockerels. At the end of the year I 
was over $700 to the good, and a new idea was beginning to dawn 
on me — I say "new," because it was new to me — that money could 
be made in buying, as well as in selling. Up to this time I had been 
buying my grain from month to month, as I needed it, I now began 
to learn that I could save from ten to twenty-five per cent by buying 
a year's supply at the right season, just after harvest. 

The fifth year found me with some splendid stock birds and 
eight hundred Leghorn pullets and hens. I was now satisfied that 
market eggs were going to be the principal source of income, and 
that it paid to sell off all the young cockerels as soon as possible, 
instead of making capons of them, and to fill up their place with 
pullets. 

I made a contract with a large hotel to take all my market eggs, 
and agreed to send them in every day, to insure their getting them 
strictly fresh. During the year the demand for settings increased 
steadily and I sold a great many to people in all parts of the state. 
My eggs hatched strong, healthy chickens, and the fertility ran 
high. I was careful to sell only from my best stock, and was always 
ready to duplicate free, in cases where the eggs had arrived in bad 
condition through careless handling during transit. 

The fifth year is now at an end. A^Iy sales have been about $3000. 
The food has cost $1,200, and labor, $500; I am therefore $1,300 
ahead by the year's work. Had I employed one boy instead of 
two, and done some of the manual work myself, I could have netted 
a clear $1,500. I have learned more this year than I would have 
thought possible, and still think I am going to learn something new 
each year about chickens, as long as I continue to raise them. I 
know more today than I did five years ago, but I am a long way 
from being an expert. I am simply a practical man, running a 
poultry plant on strictly business lines, under conditions suited to 
this climate, where poultry grows more slowly than in a country 
where there are fixed seasons, where feed is dearer than in most 
parts of the United States, and where the cost of labor is almost 
prohibitive. 



FOR vSOUTHERN CALIFORNIA 11 

This little account of my work makes no pretence of being a 
complete manual of poultry raising. There are plenty of excellent 
works of that kind already on the market, some of which I shall 
have occasion to mention later on. I am only trying to give a plain 
statement of facts about poultry raising in Southern California, 
where conditions are essentially different from those that prevail 
in the East. The knowledge that I have now would have saved 
me much time and money if I could have availed myself of it at the 
start ; and it is with the hope of saving other beginners from similar 
errors that I am offering this record of my experience. 



12 A PRACTICAL POULTRY PLANT 

CHAPTER II. 



m 



GETTING BEARINGS 

There is little dano-er of overdoing the poultry business in 
Southern California for many years to come. Tourists swarm here 
from all parts of the country almost all through the year ; while 
eggs and poultry in cold storage are shipped in from other states 
by the carload (1850 car loads last year) ; every year sees new 
poultry plants started, which after a longer or shorter period — gen- 
erally shorter — are abandoned as failures. 

The reasons are many ; lack of capital, lack of experience and 
push, inability to look ahead, getting tired too soon, are all fre- 
quent causes of short-lived experiments ; but the principal reasons 
are ignorance of the markets, and plants that are laid out poorly 
and worked without system. Perhaps this last reason is most 
often the true one. Some people are naturally good organizers, 
and these can generally get good results without much outside 
help ; but the majority will succeed better and quicker by following 
in the footsteps of one who has made a practical success of his 
business. Avoid the person who can tell you all about it, but has 
nothing to show but a plant on paper. 

It is impossible to fix the exact capital necessary for starting the 
poultry business ; some will say one thing, while others will think 
quite differently. In this book I am going to work out a plant that 
will take all of one man's time, and give him an income of about 
$1,500 a year, net. I would not advise a larger plant than one man 
can manage, by giving all his time to it. 

The poultry business keeps one very close to it all the time, and 
the work becomes very monotonous. I consider it a safer plan to 
be content with a smaller income, and pay a boy to do the rough 
work. With a little supervision the average boy can be taught to 
do all the cleaning and to do it thoroughly. Too much routine 
work is apt to make one restless and impatient, and when that 
spirit manifests itself, the income is sure to suffer ; so I strongly 
advocate keeping a good, steady boy to do all the cleaning and 
hard work, leaving the owner free, to a certain extent, to give his 
time and brains to general supervision, feeding, incubating, brood- 
ing and care of the young stock. 

The orchard and kitchen garden will amply repay him for all the 



FOR SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA 13 

care he can give them. I mention kitchen garden and orchard, as 
I am considering in these pages a home, as well as a poultry 
business. 

Let us take the case of a stranger arriving in Los Angeles with 
his family and, say, $10,000. Should he have less than this I would 
advise h'im to spend less on his house, but to be prepared to invest 
at least $5,000 in the business from which he expects to derive his 
income. 

He will at first go for a few days to a quiet hotel or boarding 
house, where the charges are moderate, and then rent a small house 
or flat, furnished or unfurnished, according to his needs. Good, 
serviceable furniture can be bought at a moderate price, but it 
would be as well not to get more than is absolutely needed until 
the future home is located. 

Two or three months can be profitably spent in visiting the dif- 
ferent towns of Southern California, none of which are more than a 
few hours by train from Los Angeles. The pleasure and health 
resorts should receive the most attention, for there will be found the 
greatest demand for choice poultry and fresh eggs. Let the final 
decision as to a resting place be arrived at only after much thought 
and consideration. Remember that a month, or even two months, 
spent in weighing the pros and cons of the place that is to be the 
home for perhaps many years, is time profitably spent, and prob- 
ably means the success of the new undertaking. There are beau- 
tiful places in Southern California, and deadly dreary places, and 
the higher prices commanded by land in attractive localities is 
money well invested. A point that requires much thought and per- 
sonal experience, or, rather, the experience of those longer in the 
country, is the choice of land that has a reasonable prospect of 
rising in value in the near future. 

Southern California is a young and growing country, and in 
many localities land values have increased by leaps and bounds 
within the last few years. For instance, I am living on land that 
was bought for $50 an acre twenty years ago. Thirteen years later 
it brought $500 an acre, and at the present writing, it and most of 
the surrounding lands are considered reasonable at $1,000 an acre. 
There is an encouraging possibility that after ten or fifteen years 
of work, the land that was bought by the acre can be sold by the 
lot, and enough be realized to provide a comfortable competency 
for one's declining years. 



14 A PKACTICAL POULTRY PLANT 

Until one has looked about for himself and found a place that 
appeals to him, it is wise to shun real estate agents and others who 
have land to sell. In fact, never let anyone know you are looking 
for a place, for if you do you will have a task before you that only 
one very familiar with the dififerent localities and conditions can 
possibly bring to a successful issue, that is, the choice of the best 
place amongst the many that will be offered. Of course, one may 
strike it lucky, but it is much better to take the safer course, and 
decide only after careful investigation from different points, even 
if the living expenses do go on a little longer. Nothing is more com- 
mon and nothing more disheartening than to find after a year or 
two that one has made the wrong selection in the choice of a home. 
It is done every day here. 

One of the first things that strikes the stranger, is the feeling of 
jealousy between the different towns. It is a rare thing to hear a 
good word spoken of "the other town." Personal observation is 
therefore the only safe way, and both experience and observation 
lead me to lay much stress on this point in advising a beginner. 

I must give one other warning. BEWARE OF THE EN- 
THUSIAST! He has nothing to sell, nothing to gain, and is there- 
fore the more dangerous. The average man, hearing a would-be 
seller dilate on the advantages of his piece of property, naturally 
allows his common sense to suggest that there are two sides to a 
bargain. Unfortunately, this common sense is often absent or 
asleep when the enlivening views of the enthusiast are being set 
forth, especially if they happen to be about a piece of property that 
the listener happens to fancy. The enthusiast is usually a well- 
meaning person, but almost always unreliable as a counsellor, for 
to get a plain, unvarnished, conservative opinion from him is an 
utter impossibility. As a guide he is worse than useless. Mind, 
I don't believe in letting the pessimist have all the hearing; the best 
way is to try to strike a happy medium by weighing both sides, 
and then using your careful judgment. 

I fear my reader will think I am a good deal off my course, but I 
am trying to fill the needs that I myself experienced as a stranger 
here, some six years ago. A good start is as important in this 
business as in any other ; and the man who wants to make a living 
from poultry can not afford to make avoidable mistakes. 

In the preceding pages I advised keeping the plant within the 
compass of one man's labor. This is sure to strike the ambitious 



FOK SOUTHERN CALIFOKNIA 15 

beginner as unenterprising. If one man's labor can be made to net 
an income of $1,500 a year, it is a very natural inference that two 
men could double, or four men quadruple, those figures. But poultry 
raising has" its difficulties and limitations, as is probably the case 
with every business. 

The best eastern poultry journals fix the profitable limit at two 
thousand birds, and the repeated failures of plants that have started 
on a much larger scale seem to bear them out. If the editors of 
these papers were working in California they would probably cut 
down their figures even lower. There are various reasons for this, 
but an all-sufficient one lies in the difficulty of getting skilled labor, 
or responsible and intelligent labor, or indeed, labor of any kmd. 
In these days, and especially in this part of the world, where the 
labor supply is verv insufficient, the employer must be prepared to 
find himself single handed at any hour. In some kinds of work 
this is not so disastrous to the enterprise, but in poultry raising no 
detail of the routine can be omitted safely for a day. I have tested 
the matter thoroughlv, and find that with the most careful plan- 
ning, one thousand laying hens and the younger birds necessary 
to reinforce them is the utmost limit of one man's capacity. 

So it is better not to undertake too much, at least at first, but to 
consider a plant that will house and yard a thousand layers, and 
hatch a thousand chickens every year. In the ordinary course of 
nature about half of these will be pullets, and the other half cock- 
erels. The latter should be sold as broilers when twelve weeks old, 
and the pullets kept growing until the hens begin to drop ofif in 
their laying, which will be toward the end of July, or just before 
they moult. Arrange to sell off five hundred hens now, clean out 
their houses, and fill up with the five hundred pullets. These 
pullets will be laying while the remaining five hundred hens are 
moulting, and by the beginning of December all the thousand birds 
should be laying from seven to ten eggs each a month. This 
average increases up to April, when they should be laying about 
eighteen eggs a month ; after this it will gradually decrease as the 
moulting season draws near. Of course these dates are only ap- 
proximate, and sometimes vary as much as six or eight weeks. I 
am speaking of White Leghorns, as I consider them one of the best 
breeds for our purpose, and besides, my data concerning them are 
from my own personal experience, for I am simply telling you what 
I have done, and am doing now. 



16 A PRACTICAL POULTRY PLANT 

Many people talk of the two hundred egg a year hen as though 
she were an established fact. I find that a hundred and thirty-two 
eggs a year, is a good average to work on. I have averaged a hun- 
dred and forty-six eggs from 900 hens, but prefer to work on the 
lower number. I would not knowingly hatch eggs from a two 
hundred egg hen towards the end of the season, for the progeny 
would naturally be weaklings. The -tremendous drain on the vitality 
of the hen would, in my opinion, finish her in a season as a breeder. 

We can reckon on getting eleven dozen eggs per hen per year ; 
these eggs will average twenty-five cents a dozen, or $2.75 a year ; 
allowing $1.20 for feed, this will leave a profit of $1.55 per hen, or 
$1,550 on a thousand hens. The broilers should sell at forty cents 
each and cost twenty cents to raise, leaving a profit of twenty cents 
each, or $100. This gives a total profit of $1,650. The sale of the 
five hundred old hens will pay for hatching and raising the pullets 
to laying age. I would consider the $100, from the sale of the 
broilers as an emergency fund, for all kinds of little expenses are 
constantly creeping in that cannot be classed as feed expenses. 



FOR SOUTHEKN CALIFORNIA l7 

CHAPTER III. 



LAYING OUT THE PLANT 

Five acres of ground is about as much as one person can attend 
to ; that is, one acre for the home, lawn, orchard, garden and stable, 
the other four for the chickens. This land should be selected not 
too far from the center of a city — if possible, not more than three 
or four miles, and near a car-line or depot, for convenience in 
sending in eggs to market while fresh. A daily egg delivery that 
can be depended on always, is of great importance, for the best 
prices can only be obtained by keeping the customer steadily sup- 
plied every day, with eggs that are absolutely fresh. (Any egg 
found outside the nest, whose age is in the least doubtful, should 
go to your own kitchen. This is a golden rule in the poultry 
business.) 

Often arrangements can be made with a good hotel to supply it 
with eggs at a fixed rate, all through the year. This is an advan- 
tageous plan, as a first-class hotel is glad to pay well for eggs that 
are above reproach ; and all the eggs that can be raised on four 
acres will barely supply an average hotel. The hotel may also take 
all the superfluous birds as well, but would want them dressed, 
not alive. 

Land can be bought for from $ioo to $200 an acre, within a rea- 
sonable distance of most of the southern California towns ; and 
keeping in view the increasing value of land, it would probably be 
wiser to get closer in and pay the higher price. 

It is not necessary to get the finest farming land for chickens, 
but it is as well to get fairly good land, and if some trees are on it, 
so much the better, for trees are good for shade in the hot summer, 
and make the home more sightly. 

The water question is a most serious one, for without the means 
of getting water no land is of much value. During the summer five 
acres planted to home and chickens will require at least 2,500 
gallons a day. If there is a private or public water system and 
means of getting the water piped to the place, it will cost you from 
fifteen to twenty-five cents a thousand gallons by meter measure- 
ment ; in some places it may be more. But be sure that 2,500 gal- 
lons a day can be forthcoming in the hottest weather, before buying 
the Hnd. 



18 A PRACTICAL POULTRY PLANT 

In many places water can be developed on the land by digging 
a well from thirty to a hundred feet deep. If others on adjoining 
land get their water in this way, you may be reasonably sure of 
being able to do the same, and it is far preferable to buying water 
from a company. I have tried both \vays, and find it cheaper and 
more satisfactory to be my own water company. 

Let us suppose that the five acres of land have been selected 
within easy distance of the town, at $200 an acre. The land lies 
sufficiently high to escape floods in the rainy season, and is not so 
steep that the top soil will wash with a heavy rain. The water 
supply has been settled, either through a water company, or by 
having proof that it can be obtained at a reasonable depth by dig- 
ging a well. If a well is to be dug, it should be done at once, and 
for information on this subject I refer to the chapter on "Water." 

Summer is the best time to buy, as real estate is generally slack 
at this season ; towards the end of the year, when the rains may be 
expected, it has a tendency to rise. There is also the advantage of 
having five or six months to get everything settled and in good 
shape before the hatching season begins. 

For convenience, I have made a diagram of five acres in a piece 
four hundred feet wide and about five hundred and fifty feet long. 
Of course, the ground may be of quite a dififerent shape, and the 
yards arranged differently ; but if the general idea be grasped, the 
shape would be immaterial, so long as compactness, accessibility 
and convenience for feeding and watering are observed. 

In laying out your land, the first thing to do is to make a careful 
and correct outline chart of it. For the home, reserve a space of 
about 140 X 170 feet, or the size of three city lots, in the southwest 
corner of the five acres. The prevailing winds come from this 
direction, and the house being here no unpleasant odors are likely 
to be wafted towards it. A lawn of about a hundred feet square is 
planted to white clover, a strip of which can be cut each day and 
fed to the chickens fresh. There is nothing better than white 
clover for keeping fowls in good condition and making them lay 
good, well-flavored eggs. Then, locate barn, store house, incubator 
house, two brood houses, and twelve small houses and yards for the 
small chickens. Arrange for all of these to be near the dwelling 
house, so that a few steps will take you to any of them at any time. 
The force of this will be appreciated during the hatching season, 
for the lamps, of which there will be from ten to fourteen con- 



FOR SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA 19 

stantly burning for months, must be looked at the last thing at 
night, before turning in, to insure a safe night. 

Now, when everything is satisfactorily arranged, go with a tape 
line and stake off on the ground all that you have marked on the 
chart. The balance of the land must then be divided into twelve 
large double yards to accommodate the thousand grown hens. In 
plotting out the grounds, follow the plans marked in my chart as 
closely as possible. I have aimed to have all my houses face south, 
and be flooded with sunlight all day ; also, to save footsteps as 
much as possible, and yet give the birds room enough to thrive in. 

Sunlight drives away smells and keeps the houses sweet. When 
birds are kept under these conditions they are easily kept free from 
lice by spraying the perches once a week with a strong disinfect- 
ant, and by keeping a small piece of ground moist and soft for a 
dust bath. I claim that by my system of housing and caring for the 
birds, the old fashioned plan of dusting each bird with insect 
powder is absolutely unnecessary ; and to prove it I can truly say 
that my hens are free from lice and mites nearly, if not all the time. 
I have picked up hens constantly, and after a most careful search 
have found nothing. This state of freedom from insects is possible 
only by using incubators and brooders, for a setting hen will breed 
and impart them to her chicks, no matter how often she is dusted. 
In a warm climate like ours one of the chief causes of weak hens, 
and, consequently, poor laying qualities, is insects. 

We will now suppose that the ground is laid out and ready for 
fencing and. building. Before going any farther, a few remarks on 
the materials to be used and the labor to be employed will be in 
place. 

After five year's use I find that all my houses with cement floors, 
fences, posts, etc., are in perfect order and no expenses for patching 
or renewing have been incurred in that time, except for painting 
and whitewashing. But where I have used wood floors, I have just 
had to replace them with cement. This convinces me that it is 
better to do good work in the beginning, and so have something 
that will last without tinkering, for fifteen or twenty years or even 
more. My wooden floors would have lasted a good deal longer if 
I had built them higher above the ground ; but that plan has serious 
objection, for it leaves a space for the accumulation of dirt and 
rubbish ; and the hens are fond of laying in such places, which neces- 
sitates one's crawling in after the eggs, and a painful loss of time 



20 A PRACTICAL POULTRY PLANT 

and temper. Sometimes, during the rainy season, water gets under 
these floors and makes things highly dangerous for the fowl's 
health, besides creating bad odors. I am therefore a believer in 
cement floors, lightly covered with sand or dry soil ; the droppings 
are then easily removed each day and a handful or so of sand 
thrown over the floor again. In the brooders, with so many lamps 
burning, cement is safer than wood. Again, in store room and feed 
house, cement is a safeguard against rats getting in through the 
floor. 

1 use surfaced wood for my buildings. I find it pays to have 
the rafters, studding and plates of surfaced Oregon pine, and the 
sides of rustic which is surfaced on one side only. The doors are 
of flooring, which makes a stronger job than redwood. Surfaced 
woods are more easily handled, the joints fit better, and the saw 
stays sharp a good deal longer. It irritates one to see a carpenter, 
at $3 or $4, spend ten minutes several times a day sharpening saws. 
which is usually the case when rough lumber is being used. 

Sawn shakes, 12" to weather, are just as good as shingles for 
roofing, if they are painted as soon as laid. Here again we can save 
a good deal of time, as ihe average man can cover twice as fast with 
shakes than with shingles. 

I paint everything outside just as soon as the carpenter finishes 
a house, and whitewash the inside and cement floor as well. This 
painting, before the wood dries out too much, keeps it in good shape 
indefinitely. I have shake roofs treated in this manner, that after 
five years do not show a split or a curled edge. I use good paint 
for the first coat, and afterwards paint every two or three years. 

Some may consider my methods rather expensive for chicken 
houses. But experience proves that a little more in the initial cost 
is money saved later on ; and besides, a neat, well built house is 
much easier to keep clean. Here in Southern California it behooves 
us never to lose sight of the fact that labor is very dear, very scarce, 
and not very good at the best. A new country afifords so many 
openings for the average man that the employer often has to take 
whatever offers, and be thankful for a poor bargain. Sometimes one 
finds it impossible to get any help, and has to turn to and do every- 
thing alone, and at such times he appreciates the blessing of a con- 
venient and well regulated plant. I think my plant pretty good, 
and were I building again I would have it still better ; for nothing 
is more disheartening than constant renewals and repairs. No, it 



FOR SOLTHERN CALIFORNIA 21 

is safer to finish with capital at the beginning and consider all profit 
as profit, not to be broken into for what should have been done 
thoroughly at the start. 

For the first six months, while the plant is building, it pays 
handsomely to employ a good, all-round man ; one who is handy 
with tools, who uses his brain as well as his hands, and especially, 
one who will take an interest in his work. Pay him well and treat 
him with consideration, and he will soon get the run of the ropes> 
and you will not have to be continually changing, and with each 
change having to explain everything over again to the new man. 



22 A PRACTICAL POULTRY PLANT 

CHAPTER IV. 



BUILDINGS AND SPECIFICATIONS 

I would have a carpenter build the two brood houses, the store 
house, one hen house and one chicken house. The handy man can 
build the rest of the hen houses and chicken houses from the car- 
penter's models. You would then be sure of having all your houses 
built on correct principles. 

The first thing to build will be the store house, which can be 
used all through the building operations for storing the hardware, 
tools, paints, etc. From the beginning, insist on having everything 
portable under lock and key each night ; no time is then wasted in 
the morning looking for things, which means quite a saving of time 
in the course of a year. 

A corner of the house can be partitioned off to make a room in 
case a man is hired who will live on the place ; or the family can 
live in it with the addition of a few screens, while the residence is 
being built. Very little grain will be required for the first nine 
months after the plant is started, so the house will be comparatively 
empty. 

• To the novice, this house will appear rather, and unnecessarily, 
a big expense; but as time goes on, the comfort and necessity of it 
will be more and more felt. The money saved in one year, by buy- 
ing the year's supply at the right time instead of in small lots, will 
tnore than pay the whole cost of the house. This is one of the 
economies that greatly adds to the success of the chicken business. 
A good start with a well built and systematically arranged plant 
' means less time lost in tinkering, and therefore more time available 
for caring for the birds. 

The store house must be rat-proof, so a cement floor will be 
best. It will be one story, and 20x30 feet, large enough to store the 
grain necessary for feeding a thousand birds for one year, and the 
usual odds and ends belonging to the plant. Lay it ofif as near the 
road as possible, for the convenience of hauling stores ; then, after 
watering the ground at least eighteen inches deep and firming it 
by tamping, get it fairly level ; but be careful not to lower it below 
the general contour of the land, for we do not want a basin for the 
water to lodge in during the rainy season. When level, take some 
3"x4" sawn redwood posts ten feet long, and lay them in the form 



FOK SOUTH EKN CALIFORNIA 



23 



of a frame around the outside edge of the foundation, with the 4" 
side of the wood touching the ground. After leveling them with a 
spirit level, drive wooden pegs in every two feet, on the outside of 
the posts (Fig. i). We now have a frame ready for the cement floor, 




which, when filled with concrete and smoothed over with cement, 
will give us a f^oor three inches thick. Having the frame well 
pegged and perfectly level makes the tamping and leveling of the 
concrete easy work. It will be well to remember that a little time 
spent on having all the frames for foundations perfectly level, and 
the corners square, will be time well spent, for uneven and crooked 
foundations make slow and unsatisfactory work when building the 
house. 

Make a rough box about four feet wide and six feet long, and 
six inches deep, for mixing up the concrete and cement, and do all 
the mixing alongside the foundation. 

The usual way of making concrete is one part of good cement 
to six or seven parts of broken stone, gravel, or slag. Mix dry, and 
when ready, spray water on gently, at the same time turning the 
materials over and over, until the mass will hold no more water, 
and yet retain the water already in it. Now shovel it into the frame 
until it is level with the top, then block it up with th^ piece of post 
A (Fig. i) and commence tamping it with a regular hand tamp. 
Tamp it all over until it is hard and level, and about half an inch 
below the level of the frame. Now move the post A back another 
foot, and stake it in firmly, ready for the next batch of concrete. 
After the first batch you will know exactly how far back to put the 
wood. 

When the concrete is in, mix one part of cement to two parts 
sand (be sure to get sharp sand, not sand with the edges rounded 
off), and enough water to stay in the mixture and not run out. Be 
careful to mix the cement and sand thoroughly before adding the 



24 A PRACTICAL POULTRY PLANT 

water. Lay it on the concrete, the same as before, level it with the 
top of the frame, and then smooth it ofif with a steel plastering 
trowel. With the constant smoothing a little water will settle on 
top of the cement ; shake a little dry cement on, and work it over 
until it gets a smooth, glossy surface. 

Before starting the concrete and cement work, have all the ma- 
terials in readiness, and never mix until you are ready for laying it, 
for no time must be lost between the operations if you want good, 
durable work. When the cementing is finished cover it an inch or 
so deep with sand, or else some sacks, and keep the covering wet 
for several days, so as to giv^e the fovmdation a chance to set firm 
and hard, without cracking. 

The store house is the only foundation that need be three inches 
deep, for it has to stand the strain of a good many tons of grain. 
The other houses can have the frames filled and tamped one inch 
deep with soil, before putting in the concrete and cement. This 
would give about one and three-quarters inches of concrete and a 
quarter inch of cement. If the work is done properly and quickly, 
a quarter inch of cement will hold just as firm as an inch ; all that is 
required is a smooth, glossy surface that will not hold dirt. 

The best plan for one who is not vised to this sort of work 
would be to get the frames of the foundations for the store house 
and two brood houses laid and levelled, then get a regular cement 
sidewalk layer to come out and contract for concreting and cement- 
ing them. He will charge from seven to ten cents a square foot for 
laying them, according to the distance he has to haul materials, and 
the thickness of the cement you want laid on the concrete. You 
can then watch and note how he does it, and the proportions he 
uses, where he gets his stone or gravel from and how much it costs 
per load. He will, if decently treated, tell you how to lay the rest 
of the foundations yourself, and in the cheapest way. A dollar or 
two thrown in over the contract price, and a pleasant manner, will 
mean a lot of information on the subject, that will save many dol- 
lars in the construction of the rest of the foundations and make a 
much better job of them. 

It is better to put a little more cement than concrete around 
the edge of the foundation, close to the frame, so that when the 
frame is removed cement, not concrete, will be exposed to the 
weather. (Fig. 2) 

The foundations and frames should be kept wet "and not dis- 



FOR SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA 



25 



tiirbed for at least ten days, after which the frames can be removed. 
The redwood posts used for the frames will afterwards be used for 
fence posts. 

When finished the foundations should be at least three inches 
above the level of the surrounding ground, or else a lot of trouble 
will be experienced in having to make drainage ditches around the 
houses in wet weather. Dry houses, all the time, are absolutely 
necessary for the health of the birds. 

In building the store house (Fig. 3) lay the plates on top of the 
cement, and when the frame is up let the rustic overlap an inch or 
two over the cement. This will make it rat and water proof. (Fig. 2) 






nA 




Use surfaced wood on the four sides ; 2"x4" Oregon pine for 
plates, studs and rafters, and 8" rustic for the outside ; sawn shakes 
12" to weather for roof; sheeting i"x4" Oregon pine; studding and 
rafters about three feet from center to center. All of the houses 
are made from these materials and measurements. Doors are 
cheaper bought ready made than if made by yourself or a carpenter. 
Where windows are required, instead of putting the sashes one over 
the other, put them side by side, on hinges opening in, for all the 
houses are low. 

The store house will need one full sized door in front and one 



26 A PRACTICAL POULTRY PLANT 

behind, and about four sets of two sashes side by side, a bench and 
a few shelves close to the back door ; but all the rest of the house 
should be bare, for the stowage of the grains, etc. I keep all my 
grains in separate piles, receiving them through the front door and 
using them from the back door. 

Arrange windows and front and back doors the same, so that 
the space between the two doors is kept free, leaving the two sides 
for stowing the sacks. No windows are required at the ends of the 
house, for the sacks will have to be stowed high up against the 
walls. Always keep "cat space" between the walls and the sacks, 
in case of a damp wall, or water getting in. Fill up every little 
space between the sheeting and anywhere else that might let a 
mouse in. 

When finished, paint at once, before the wood gets sun dried 
and the shakes curl and split. 

Use plain but strong hinges and locks, and see that the doors 
and windows are proof against a driving rain. A good screen door 
on the back door, and a screen on one of the windows, will give all 
the ventilation necessary in the day time. None is required at night. 
• From now on I shall have occasion to mention articles that 
have to be bought ready made, such as incubators, fence wire, etc., 
etc. I shall give the names of the things that I prefer and where 
to get them in Southern California. It is not usual to do this, un- 
less as an advertisement, so I wish to state that in this case I am 
not paid for anything that is mentioned in this book. In fact, I have 
refused advertisements, for I want a perfectly free hand in men- 
tioning the things that suit me. No doubt there may be similar 
articles in the market that are just as good, but I do not happen to 
know them. I am merely offering the novice the opportunity to 
profit by my experience, for I have done a lot of buying and con- 
demning, until I got what I considered the best. My plant being 
complete, there is not much likelihood of my buying anything more, 
and asking for a reduction on the strength of this book. 



FOR SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA 



27 




Specifications for Store House. (Fig. 3) 

Cement floor, 600 square leet @ 7c per foot 

Plates and Braces,* 15 — 2"x4"x2o' 845 O. P. 200 ft. 
Rafters, 22 — 2"x4"xi4' 545 O. P. 200 ft. 

Studs, 25 — 2"x4"xi6' 345 O. P. 420 ft. 

Sheeting, 60 — i"x4"xi6' 543 O. P. 330 ft. 



,$ 42. ou 



1150 ft. @ $24 27.50 

Surfacing above 6.00 

Rustic, 90 — i"x8"x2o' No. 2 @ $30 36.00 

Window and Door Sill, 22 ft. of 2"x8" 1.50 

Casements, etc., 7 — i"x5"x2o' 345 Redwood @ $40 2.50 

Sawn Shakes, 75 bundles @ 40c per bundle 30.00 

2 Colonial Doors, i^"x3'x6' 6" @ $3.50 each 7.00 

4 Windows, 27"x44", 12 lights, @ $1.50 aech 6.00 

Paint, Hardware, etc 36.50 

Carpenter, 10 days @ $3.50 per day 35-00 



$230.00 



*Overhead joists to keep the walls from bulging out. 




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A PKACTICAL POULTRY PLANT 29 



Specifications for Brood House No. i. (Fig. 8) 

Cement Floor, 700 square feet @ 7c per foot $ 49.00 

Plates, 12 — 2"x4"x2o' S4s O. P. 160 ft. 

Studs, 35— 2"x4"xi2' S4S O. P. 280 ft. 

Rafters, 18— 2"x4"xi8' 845 O. P. 220 ft. 

Sheeting, 50 — 2"x4"x22' S4s O. P. 350 ft. 



1010 ft. @ $24 24.00 

Surfacing above 5.00 

Rustic, 60— i"x8"x2o' No. 2, 815 ft. @ $30 24.50 

Casements, 6 — i"x5"x22' S4s Redwood @ $40 2.40 

2 Colonial Doors, i;^"x2'6"x6'6" @ $2.40 each 4.80 

4 Windows, 27"x44", 12 lights, @ $1.25 each 6.00 

Sawn Shakes, 80 bundles @ 40c 32.00 

Paint, Hardware, etc i7-30 

Carpenter, 10 days @ $3.50 per day 35-00 



$200.00 

Window sills can be made from the i"x5" redwood for case- 
ments. 

Nail a piece of coarse screen wire inside of ventilator opening 
to keep out cats, etc. 



JMU 



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A PRACTICAL POULTRY PLANT 



31 



Specifications for No. 2 Brood House With Incubator Room and 
Feed Room. (Fig. 9) 



Cement Floor, 700 square feet @ jz per foot. . 
Plates, 15 — 2"x4"x2o' 545 O. P. 200 ft. 

Studs, 40 — 2"x4"xi4' S4S O. P. 400 ft. 

Rafters, 18 — 2"x4"xi8' S4S O. P. 220 ft. 

Sheetings 50 — i"x4"x22' 545 O. P. 350 ft. 



$ 49.00 



1 170 @ $24 28.80 

Surfacing above 6.00 

Window and Door Sills, 24 ft. 2"x8" 1.50 

Shelves, etc., 5 — i"xi2"x2o' 545 Redwood 3.00 

Rustic, 80 — i"x8"x2o' No. 2, 1080 ft. @ $30 32.40 

Casements, etc., 6 — i"x5"x22' S4S Redwood 2.40 

*Ceiling, 24 — i"x6"xi4' No. 2 Flooring 5.00 

Colonial Doors, 4 — i^"x2' 6"x6' 6" @ $2.40 each 9.60 

Windows, 5 — 27"x44", 12 lights, @ $1.50 each 7.50 

Sawn Shakes, 80 bundles @ 48c each 32.00 

Paint, Hardware, etc 27.00 

Carpenter, 10 days @ $3.50 per day 35-00 



$240.00 



*Incubator room to be ceiled overhead only. 




DIAGRAM OF INCUBATOR ROOM VENTILATOR 



32 



A PRACTICAL POULTRY PLANT 




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FOR SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA 33 

Specifications for Chicken House. (Fig. lo) 

Cement Floor, zy square feet @ /c per foot. $ 1.90 

Frame, 10 — i"x4"xio' 545 O. P. 

Perches, 3 — i"x2"xi2' S4S O. P. — 50 ft. @ $26 1.30 

Rustic, 12 — i"x8"xi2' No. 2 @ 30 3.00 

I Sash, 22"y.2y" , 6 Hghts 75 

Sawn Shakes, 4 bundles @ 40c per bundle 1.60 

Flashing 25 

Paint and Hardware (2 strong strap hinges) 1.20 

Complete $10.00 

The flashing is important and goes under the shakes around 
the frame of flap to prevent leaks in rainy weather. 

The window is a fixture, as all the ventilation necessary comes 
through the roof, the flap of which is propped up with a perch at 
cleaning time, and left open all day. When closing the flap at 
night fasten it down with a hook, as a precaution against its being 
blown open at night by a gust of wind. 

After the house is built lay it on its back and thoroughly tar 
around the bottom where the cement will go, and when dry, place 
it on its foundation, which has been previously watered and tamped 
level and hard, drive in some stakes around the outside, to keep the 
house in shape while tamping the floor, the concrete and cement 
can then be laid. I find this plan of laying the cement floor after 
the house is made and using the house itself for a frame, very con- 
venient with small houses which can be easily moved. 

The small door in front will give all the ventilation necessary 
at night, in fact on a cold rainy night I use a wooden slide over this 
opening unless the chickens are over nine or ten weeks old. 



Specifications for 12 Chicken Yards. (Fig. 11) 

Sawn Posts, 224 — 3"x4"x8' Redwood @ 20c each $ 44.80 

Gates (12), 24 — i"x4"xi2' s4s O. P., 100 ft. @ $26 2.60 

100 rds 6 ft. "Union Lock" Poultry Fence Wire @ 60c per rd. 60.00 

Paint, Distillate, and Coal Tar 4.00 

Hinges, Spikes, Staples and Hooks 2.00 

12 Water Tins, 2 gallons each and shallow 6.00 

12 Grit Jars @ loc each 1.20 

36 Feed Troughs, 4 feet long and shallow 12.00 

$133.00 



A PRACTICAL POULTRY PLANT 35 



Specifications for Hen House. (Fig. 12) 

Cement Floor, 192 square feet @ 7c per foot $1345 

Plates and Perches, 9 — 2"x4"x24' S4S O.P. 144 ft. 
Studs, 15 — 2"x4"xi2' S4S O. P. 120 ft. 

Rafters, 9 — 2"x4"xi2' S4s O. P. y2 ft. 

Sheeting, 13 — i"x4"x26' S4S O. P. 120 ft. — 456 ft 11.00 

Surfacing above 2.00 

Rustic, i"x8"x24' No. 2, 480 feet @ $30 14.00 

*Doors and Flaps, 12 — i"x6"xi2" No. i Flooring, j^ ft. @ $40 2.90 

Sawn Shakes, 24 bundles @ 40c per bundle 9.60 

Paint, Hardware, etc 8.05 

Nests 2.30 

Jail 1.30 

$65.00 

*Doors and flaps are best made from pine flooring, which is 
much stronger and holds together better than redwood. « 



Nests. 

Bottom boards, i — i"xi2"xio' 545 Redwood. 
Bottom boards, i — i"x3"xio' S4S Redwood. 
Side boards, i — i"xi2"xi4' S4s Redwood. 

Side boards, i — i"x6"xio' 543 Redwood $1.10 

Lid boards, 6 — 3^"x6"xio' pine ceiling 1.05 

Hinges and nails 15 

$2.30 

Jail. 

Frame, i — 2"x4"xi6' S4S O. P. 

Frame, 4 — i"x2"xio' S4s O. P $0.50 

Grating, 18 — ^"x2"x6' surfaced battens 30 

I Bundle Sawn Shakes 40 

I Pair Small Strap Hinges 10 

$1.30 





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A PRACTICAL POULTRY PLANT 37 



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Specifications for 12 Double Hen Yards. (Fig. 13) 
Each single yard being 30x180 feet. 

Sawn Posts, 54 — 6"x6"x8' Redwood @ 60c each $ 32.40 

Sawn Posts, 500 — 3"x4"x8' Redwood @ 20c each 100.00 

Gates (24), 48— i"x4"xi2' S4s O. P.— 200 ft. @ $26 5.20 

400 rds. 6 ft."Union Lock" Poultry Fence Wire @ 60c per rd 240.00 

1000 ft. Soft No. 9 Wire for bracing corner posts 3.40 

Paint, Distillate and Coal Tar 12.00 

Hinges, Spikes, Staples and Hooks 4-oo 

*Water Tins, Feed Troughs and Grit Boxes 33.00 

$430.00 

*Each of the twelve yards will require 

I 3-gallon Galvanized Iron water Tin.. $0.75 

4 Feed Troughs, each 6 feet long 1.25 

I Grit, Shell and Charcoal Holder 75 

$2.75 or $33.00 



38 A PRACTICAL POULTRY PLANT 







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*i2 Brood House Yards. (Fig. 7) 

The photograph will give an idea of how the yards in front of 
the brood houses are arranged. Mine are rather small so I give 
the dimensions for larger ones. 

As they are close to the house the posts are surfaced and all 
the work finished as neatly as possible. No bracing posts are 
needed, as the base board and top rail make them unnecessary. 

The gates are fastened with ordinary hooks and screw eyes, 
and are made of i"x4" pine, with a bracing piece running diagonally 
from corner to corner. Let the nails go through the wood a quarter 
of an inch and then clinch them, otherwise the constant jar of open- 
ing and shutting the gates, will in time loosen and draw the nails. 
(Fig. 6) 

Posts, 1 12 — 3"x4"x6' 343 Redwood @ 20c each $22.40 

Base Boards and Gates, 56 — i"x6"xi2' 343 O. P 10.00 

Top Rails and Gates, 78— i"x4"xi2' 343 O. P 8.40 

40 rods "Union Lock" Poultry Wire @ 50c per rod 20.00 

Paint, Hardware, etc 9.20 

$70.00 



* The general chart gives only nine yards, which is a mistake. 



FOK SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA 



39 




Compost House and Sand Box. (Fig. 14) 

The lumber for building the two compost houses need not be 
bought especially for this purpose, as there will probably be enough 
pieces left over when all the building is finished to build these small 
houses, a coat of paint will cover any patchwork that may be neces- 
sary in order to use up the small pieces. 

The two sand boxes should be made from 2x12 redwood, as they 
should be made strong. They will take 6 pieces of 2"xi2"xi2' rough 
redwood and cost about $4.50. 



40 A PRACTICAL POULTRY PLANT 

CHAPTER V. 



FENCING 

The look of the place depends a good deal on the fences. A 
well stretched wire, free from sagging, and set on posts that are 
plumb and equal distances apart, makes the place look neat. I con- 
sider it most important to have the houses well built and neatly 
painted, and the fence posts and gates also painted. For my place 
I have used the color called "Golden Olive," which is the nearest 
approach to the color of the live oaks that are on it. 

For the rough sawn posts a gallon of the mixed paint is diluted 
with three or four gallons of the cheapest distillate, until it just 
colors the redwood. It is put on with a good, big brush, like white- 
wash, after the posts are set up and before the wire is stretched. 
This one coat will last as long as the posts ; and if the tops of the 
posts are well soaked with the wash, few of them will require re- 
newing in the course of ten or fifteen years. 

A few weeks before the fencing begins, get all the posts that 
will be needed and thoroughly tar one end for a distance of two 
feet up. When dry, which will be in about two weeks, give them 
another coat, filling in all cracks, and especially the sawed ofi part; 
otherwise, in wet weather the water will creep right up the heart 
of the post through capillary attraction, and in time rot it away. 
I like to have a small fire burning under the tar pot, and put on the 
tar boiling ; it penetrates the soft, porous redwood better than if 
applied cold. When the second coat is dry the posts are ready for 
setting up. 

All corner posts should have an anchor spiked on to keep them 
firm under the heavy strain of the stretched wire. They should 
then be braced in two directions, as shown in the diagram. (Fig. 15) 

A wire stretcher made especially by the wire manufacturers 
should, be used for stretching the wire. Several hundred feet can 
be stretched at one time, and only two men are required. (Fig. 16) 

I have tried several kinds of wire, but have found nothing to 
equal the Union Lock wire, made by the Union Fence Company, 
DeKalb, Illinois. It is simply impossible to make a first class job 
of wire that has a diagonal mesh, on ground that is not perfectly 
level. The Union Lock has all the wires either horizontal or per- 
pendicular, and the horizontal wires are closer at the bottom to 



FOR SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA 



41 



keep small chicks from getting through. I have some fences over 
three hundred feet long that are as tight as harp strings the whole 
distance. Short lengths, up to twenty or thirty feet can be stretched 
hand taut. A tight wire makes a better support for the posts, and 
keeps them from wobbling or getting loose in wet weather. 





The cost of this wire is slightly higher than ordinary poultry 
wire with octagonal or sextagonal mesh, but it requires no bottom 
or top rail. This last item costs more than the difference in the 
price of the wire, and is absolutely necessary where common poul- 
try fencing is used. 



42 



A PRACTICAL POULTRY PLANT 



When ready to begin fencing, which should be the last thing 
done, lay off the corners of the land with stakes. Then stretch a 
line tight from corner to corner, and drive in a stake every fifteen 
feet along this line, except the first stake from each corner post, 
which should only be about six feet ; this is called the bracing post, 
and holds one end of the brace, the other end being on the upper 
part of the post. When the stakes are all in. the post holes can be 
dug. I prefer to dig holes for one whole side of a yard, and then 
set in the posts ; this plan varies the work, which generally means 
better work. The holes should be about twenty-two inches deep, 
not less; a guide can be made with two sticks, so that all holes will 
be the same depth, thus making the tops of the posts correspond 
with the contour of the ground. 








It will pay handsomely to use post-hole diggers. I use two 
kinds (I got them from Peter Henderson, New York) and find both 
useful, as the ground often changes, and where one will not work, 
the other will. If we have started our plant about August, it will 
be close to the end of the year before the fencing begins, and the 
first rains will probably have fallen, makmg the ground soft and in 
good shape for the digging. Do not try to fence until the ground 
is in this condition, for moist soil is necessary to good firm tamping. 

When the holes are dug, set the corner or end posts in first ; 
have them perfectly plumb, and fill up the holes gradually, tamping 
hard all the time. If the hole is filled at once and then tamped, the 



FOK SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA 



43 



top will be hard and the bottom soft ; so tamp from the bottom up. 
A good tamp can be made from a six foot piece of inch and a quarter 
iron pipe with a cap screwed on the end. The corner or end posts, 
in particular, should be made very firm, for on them comes all the 
strain while stretching. While tamping, use the spirit level and 
keep your post in line, and straight with the corner posts. 

After the brace is spiked on to the corner and bracing posts, 
pass a piece of soft wire, size No. 9, around the posts and staple it 
to the corner and bracing posts ; then put the handle of the ham- 
mer through the wire above the brace, and twist the two parts tight. 
Do the same below the brace. The turns will stay in and keep 
every thing taut. (Fig. 15) 

Union Lock wire can be stretched on the frames of the gates 
before they are hung; but be sure to have all the painting finished 
before putting on the wire. Trying to paint wood covered with 
wire is dirty and slow work. The gate posts should all have headers 
to keep them from pulling apart through the strain of the wire. 
(Fig. 6) 



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44 A PRACTICAL POULTRY PLANT 

CHAPTER VI. 



HATCHING 

There are two ways of getting eggs to start the incubators the 
first season. 

The first is to give all your time and attention to building the 
plant, and then in February to buy the eggs. for hatching, by the 
incubator lot. These eggs will cost about $io per hundred if 
bought from a first class reliable man, whose hens are mature, and 
great care should be taken to get eggs from thoroughbred stock, 
that have been bred for size and laying qualities in preference to 
show and fancy points. A great deal of inbreeding is done to 
propagate birds for show purposes ; but this inbreeding has a tend- 
ency to weaken the stamina and laying qualities of the birds. 

To hatch a thousand chicks the first year, about twenty-five 
hundred eggs will be required. If all these are contracted for from 
one breeder a considerable reduction in the price per hundred can 
be looked for. 

The other way would be to build, say three of the hen houses 
the first thing, and in August buy about a hundred and fifty hens 
that have just finished their second season, and are beginning to 
moult. At this time good birds can be arranged for from a first 
class breeder at about $i each. These birds will do little else than 
eat and moult until November, when they will begin to lay fairly 
well. On no account force them by giving them stimulants, for 
you want their eggs to be strong and natural when the incubating 
season comes. I never force my breeders, as one good, fertile egg 
is worth three weak ones at that time. The care and feed of these 
birds, added to the cost of them will come to nearly as much as the 
cost of buying eggs for hatching. But a good deal of experience 
can be gained through them in four or five months, so that when 
the young ones come you will not be quite unversed in chicken lore. 
The conditions of the work must decide the course to follow. 
If you are going to try to do all, or nearly all of the building alone, 
then by all means have no birds around until the plant is complete ; 
but if you have a good man, and can afford to have a carpenter do 
some of the building, the second plan is the best. 

The incubator room faces north, and has a ceiling; it has a 
locker to the south of it for utensils and odds and ends, and is 



FOR SOUTHEKN CALIFOKNIA 



45 



wedged between the No. 2 brood house and the feed room ; all of 
these act as double walls and keep the temperature even, which is 
very necessary to successful hatching. 

I use two Cyphers' Incubators (Fig. 17), each holding from 
three hundred and sixty to three hundred and eighty eggs. The 
best position for them, where they, will be free from draughts and 
yet get good air, is marked on the floor plan of the incubator room. 
Very explicit instructions are sent with each machine, and with a 
little care and ordinary ability they are easily worked out 




with satisfactory results. "Elaine," or "Argo" oil are the 
only oils that are fit to use in either incubator or brooders. 
Sometimes I have been forced to use other oils that were 
almost as expensive ; they have invariably given me trouble, 
the wicks getting charred and a low flame resulting, after a few 
hours' use. With either of the two oils mentioned a well trimmed 
lamp will burn twenty-four hours, without any perceptible differ- 
ence in the flame and with no fear of explosion. A midnight ex- 
plosion in the ihcubator house or brood house disturbs one's peace 



46 A PRACTICAL POULTRY PLANT 

of mind, and even with cement floors may cause a fire. So, above 
all things, personally see that the best oil is used, and that the lamps 
are properly trimmed and the flame kept at the right height. I 
make it a rule to look at the lamps a few minutes- after they are 
trimmed and re-lighted, and again before I turn in for the night. 

Light the incubator and run it for a couple of days before put- 
ting in any eggs. This will give you confidence, for when you see 
that the regulator can be safely trusted to keep the temperature 
even, you will know that it is useless to be running to look at the 
thermometer every hour or so. I look at mine two or three times 
a day, never more, except when the chicks are coming out, and 
then only as a matter of curiosity, not necessity. With strong, 
fertile eggs, an even temperature throughout the hatch means 
healthy, well formed chicks ; with the same eggs an uneven tempera- 
ture will give a good many cripples, and the whole batch, with few 
exceptions, will start life under adverse conditions. When you see 
all the chickens with perfectly even, flufify plumage, and of good 
size, then you know that the eggs and the hatching conditions were 
good. Otherwise, you will have a lot of sleek, uneven birds that 
look as if their fluff had been clipped with scissors ; this is almost 
a sure sign that the heat has been uneven, causing the growth to be 
uneven also. The process of incubation should be steady and even 
all through, to obtain the best results. 

The stock from which the eggs come is really the most import- 
ant factor in raising chickens. From careful experiments that ex- 
tend over a period of five years, I find that the eggs from pullets, 
i. e., birds under a year old, do not give satisfactory results, even 
when mated to a two year old cock. Nearly every pullet egg will 
hatch, but not fifty per cent of the chicks will live, and those that do 
live grow slowly, and reach the laying stage from two to three 
months later than birds that were hatched at the same time, but 
from fully matured stock. 

This experience has been verified time after time ; in fact, T 
have made a point of hatching from yards of stock that are matured 
and also from immature stock, keeping the resulting progeny sep- 
arate, and noting results, so I am talking of something that I am 
sure of. A coincidence does not as a rule happen several consecu- 
tive times. 

A hen that has moulted for the first time and is about fifteen 
or twenty months old, mated to a year old cock, is almost certain 



FOR SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA 47 

to produce, healthy chickens. I get from fifteen to twenty per cent 
less chickens hatched from the fertile eggs of this mating than from 
the same numher of pullet eggs ; but nearly all of the chickens live, 
grow fast, and begin to lay at the proper time. 

In this climate I find that the best time to hatch the large 
breeds, such as the Asiatic and American varieties, is in February, 
March and April, and the small, or Mediterranean breeds, from 
March ist until the end of May. If the White Leghorns are hatched 
before March, they will invariably moult the same year, which 
means that they will not be ready for steady laying before January 
or February; but if hatched in March, April or May, they will get 
down to steady laying at six months old and keep steadily at it until 
the following August, when they will come to their first moult. In 
other words, birds that are hatched too early moult the same year, 
and by the second August will have laid for about six months ; 
whereas birds hatched at the right time will have laid for ten 
months before they come to their moult. We have here one of the 
principal reasons for the many failures in the chicken business. 

It is not advisable to hatch after June ist. The weather is then 
growing too hot for quick, healthy growth, and the vitality of the 
parent stock is then growing low. Repeated experiments have so 
fully convinced me on this point that I unmate all my yards on 
July first, and refuse to sell eggs for settings after that date until 
the following January, lliis means a serious financial loss to me, 
especially as so many breeders of good repute sell settings all 
through the year to customers who "have a hen that wants to set." 
These settings must be either from very immature pullets, or from 
hens that are moulting; in both cases the majority will certainly be 
weak. A bird that has laid heavily for nine or ten months and then 
goes into her moult, which is another heavy drain on her vitality, 
is in no condition to lay an egg that is fit for hatching. In the long- 
run, I believe it pays to treat your customers as you treat yourself, 
and not to sell eggs for hatching purposes that you would not breed 
from yourself. This is another mile-stone on the road to perma- 
nent success, to know when to refuse to make a sale, even when the 
customer is willing and anxious to take all responsibility ; for in 
time, when the eggs have hatched poor, weak chicks, the customer 
is apt to forget his readily assumed responsibility, and to lay the 
fault where it really belongs, namely, at the door of the seller. 

Inbreeding is a bugbear that frightens many beginners. If one 



48 A PKACTTCAIv POULTRY PLANT 

keeps several yards of the same strain of stock, for several years no 
fresh blood will be necessary ; but when it is, be surfe to try to get 
eggs, cockerels, or cocks from the original strain. I raise all mv 
own pullets, and when I think that I want new blood, I get either 
settings or cockerels from the people from whom I bought the 
original stock. I therefore, in this way, keep the same strain, con- 
stantly improving it by careful selection. 

Breeding from two different strains, even if both fowls be fine, 
thorough-bred specimens, often results in ordinary, mediocre 
progeny, especially if the breed is parti-colored, such as Barred 
Plymouth Rocks. It may take years of inbreeding to bring the 
birds up to the standard of the first parents. And fresh blood from 
a different strain sometimes has a disastrous result on the birds' 
laying qualities. If the new cock comes from a poor laying strain 
this quality is often transmitted to the offspring. 

If after the first moult is over, one picks out the choicest hens 
for his breeding yards, sees that they have plenty of exercise to keep 
them from getting itat, and then in January mates them with some 
of his finest cockerels that look strong and mature, the chances are 
that the progeny will show the results of a good mating. This can 
be done for at least three or four years. Just watch the birds and 
their records carefully, and do not change, unless at the end of a 
season the number of eggs per hen has fallen below the average. 1 
consider it impossible to lay down a set time for bringing in new 
blood, but I do believe that it is done a great deal oftener than is 
necessary, and sometimes with very poor results. 

To summarize the above, as far as White Leghorns are con- 
cerned : Select the eggs for hatching from hens that were hatched 
between March and June, moulted the following year in the fall, 
and were mated in January or February to vigorous cockerels of 
from nine to twelve months old, the hens being from twenty to 
twenty-four months old. These ages for mating have given me the 
very best results. The birds should be mated at least ten days be- 
fore the first eggs are gathered for hatching. 

For our plant we shall want three hundred and eighty eggs 
every fifteen days, beginning from February lotli to April i8th. 
This will make the actual hatching from March ist to May ist, or 
a period of three months. The eggs can safely be gathered for the 
ten days prior to each hatch, but should be gently turned or rolled 
over every day. I have several shelves with wire bottoms fixed in 



FOR SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA 49 

the incubator room, and each day I select from the day's gathering 
about thirty-eight of the finest eggs, of even size and with glossy, 
white shells. Reject all small and over-large eggs, and any that are 
crooked, or have ridges on the shells. This last is a sign that the 
hens are too fat, and if hatched, the chickens from them would very 
probably be weaklings. Place the selected eggs on the wire shelves, 
and each day move them gently by passing the hand lightly over 
them. Some people stow the eggs carefully on their sides, with the 
large end slightly up, and turn each egg separately. This takes 
time, and is no better than if the eggs are allowed to lie loosely all 
over the shelf. 

Let us suppose that the yards were mated about January 20th. 
and eggs began to be collected February ist at the rate of thirty- 
eight a day. By the loth there would be three hundred and eighty. 
If an incubator was lighted on the 8th, it should be well regulated 
by the loth and ready for the eggs. The Cyphers machine begins 
the period of incubation with the thermometer at 1023/2 degrees F., 
and if the regulator has kept the heat at this point for twenty-four 
hours before the eggs are put in, and the operator has become fa- 
miliar with the size of the lamp flame required, we can safely con- 
sider the machine ready for work. 

From now on to the end of the hatch, I would advise you to 
follow strictly the instructions that come with each incubator; they 
are easily understood, and absolutely cover the ground. Do not 
deviate from them, and especially, that rule which strictly prohibits 
opening the door during the last twenty-four hours of the hatch, 
while the little chicks are coming out. 

If all the foregoing directions have been carried out, at the end 
of twenty-one days there should be from two hundred to two hun- 
dred and fifty fine, strong, healthy youngsters ready for the brooder. 
When the hatch is over, open the door of the incubator and take 
out the trays with the empty shells, and eggs that have failed to 
hatch. Quickly free any chicks that happen to be almost out of the 
shell, put them back in the incubator, and close it again ; but any 
eggs that are slightly pipped, leave alone as a bad case. 

After the hatch is finished I keep the chicks in the incubator 
for twenty-four hours, with the thermometer at 103, and the ven- 
tilators full open. In case of an extra large hatch, where there 
would be danger from over-crowding, pick out the strongest look- 
ing chicks and put them in the brooder, until the balance left in the 



50 A PRACTICAL POULTRY PLANT 

incubator is sufficient to fill it without crowding. Do not let them 
get chilled while doing this thinning out; if the door of the room is 
closed, and the air warm, there is no danger. During the twenty- 
four hours that the chicks are kept in the incubator they will pant 
a good deal, as if too warm ; this panting does no harm, but I find 
it a good thing to open the incubator door for a minute or two, every 
two or three hours, to let them have a little fresh air. 

Have a big bucket of water handy when you open the incuba- 
tor to take out the trays of shells and unhatched eggs, and after re- 
leasing and returning to the incubator any chicks that are almost 
out of the shell, dump into the bucket everything on the tray. There 
are sure to be several eggs that are pipped and contain live 
chickens; but don't try to open the shells and release them — just 
let the water kill them quickly. If a bird is not out and free by the 
end of the twenty-first day, it will never amount to anything; it will 
probably linger a few days or weeks and then die in the brooder. 
This is the one hard part of keeping chickens in large quantities, 
and should be learned at the start. It never pays to keep weaklings. 
Lice always attack them before the strong ones, and they are liable 
to bring sickness into the flock at the slightest change of tempera- 
ture ; in fact, they are always a menace to the general health of the 
plant. It is a fallacy to suppose that with a little care they will live 
and grow big enough to be sold as broilers. Ninety-nine per cent of 
them will grow light, and never be fit for anything; so the kindest 
and easiest plan is to kill ofi^ all weaklings as soon as discovered. 

Experience shows that this lesson of killing off the unfit is 
generally the very last one to be practiced. They are easily seen, 
but the kind, though mistaken, heart of the owner always wants to 
give them another chance. This natural impulse should be stopped 
from the beginning, before sickness develops which might easily 
spread through the whole flock. 



FOR SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA 51 

CHAPTER VII. 



THE BROODER 

The brooder is a very important feature of the poultry plant, 
as it is the nursery where the baby chicks spend the first six weeks 
of their Hfe ; and if its conditions do not meet their needs, a large 
proportion of them will abandon the struggle with existence at the 
outset, while the survivors will not make as good a start as they 
should. 

Unless a brooder is evenly heated and abundantly ventilated, it 
is impossible for the chicks to thrive ; and so many of those on the 
market not having these qualifications, I propose to go into the 
subject quite fully before going on to describe the brood house and 
its work. A brooder can be heated with dead or stagnant warm air, 
or with live, moving warm air. I consider all brooders heated with 
hot water pipes or an inverted can coming through the middle of 
the floor and kept hot by a lamp under it, as belonging to the first 
class. The pipes or cans give off their heat, but the air has no cir- 
culation — or at the most; very little. 

My first brooder, a standard make, was a four section one, and 
heated by hot water pipes. On lifting the lid at night, after the 
chicks had been in it a few hours, the air was pretty bad ; and by 
morning it was very bad. I lost a large percentage of the chicks, 
and rightly laid it to the foul air of the brooder. On comparing my 
losses with those of others that I read of in various poultry papers, 
I found that I was doing fairly well, for brooder work, but when 1 
compared them with chicks hatched from similar eggs, by hens, I 
found that I was really doing anything but well with my brooder 
chicks. I lost more than two brooder raised chicks to one hen 
raised chick, and the survivors were slower in growth and weaker. 
When they came to maturity, T could notice little or no difference 
between the two lots, except that those raised by hens began laying 
sooner than the others, and had laid more eggs at the end of the 
season. 

About this time I saw in an eastern poultry journal, called 
"Farm Poultry," a long article by the Dr. Wood, whose valuable 
paper on feeding I have embodied in this book ; he had noticed the 
weak points of the brooders then on the market, and had invented 
one of his own, and had kindly given the results of his experiment 



52 



A PRACTICAL POULTRY PLANT 



to the public through "Farm Poultry," calling his brooder the "Up- 
to-Date Farm Poultry Brooder." On reading it, I saw at once the 
value of his idea, which was that the hot air should be kept moving 
all the time. I have mislaid his paper with diagrams, so have here 
given diagrams of my brooders, which I made on his principle, with 
a few minor improvements suggested during my three year's use of 
them. 

A glance at the diagrams will show the simplicity and efificiency 
of Dr. Wood's principle of heating. A sheet of heavy galvanized 
iron is heated by a lamp placed under it ; the outside cold air is 
drawn in through the air space on each side of the brooder, warmed 
on the hot plate, and then, drawing up the funnel, it strikes the 
under part of the hover and spreads over the backs of the chicks, 







after which it escapes from the hover and goes up through the ven- 
tilation slit at the top of the brooder. The result is tha,t a steady 
stream of warm, sweet air comes in and passes out all the time. 

I made nine of these brooders without loss of time, and since 
then, provided the eggs are all right and chicks properly incubated, 
have had no further trouble with slow-growing, half-dead brooder 
chicks ! I shall try to explain the method of building them, for the 
benefit of the amateur carpenter. 

Take three pieces of surfaced redwood, two of them i"x9"x3' 
and one i"x9"x4', and nail them together, making three sides of a 
square (see A, Figure 20). Get a piece of No. 22 galvanized iron, 
3'x4' and nail it on top of the frame A ; then nail around the edge a 
frame of i"x3'' suricicea pme, leaving an air space an inch and a haii 



FOR SOUTHEKN CALIFORNIA 



53 



wide at each side (see B, Fig. 20). Get some i"x6" flooring — red- 
wood is better than pine, as it does not warp with the heat — and 
nail it over the frame, leaving one inch clearance all around for the 
upper section to rest on. When the flooring is laid, cut a circular 
hole in the middle of the floor nine inches in diameter; put a gal- 
vanized iron funnel into this hole one inch deep, and nail it from 
the inside of the funnel to the edge of the flooring (Fig. 21), flush 
with the under part of the boards. The funnel should be five 
inches high above the level of the floor. Be sure ±0 make tight 
work of fitting the funnel, also of laying the floor, so that no sand 
can drop through, and no heat escape except through the funnel. 
Inside the funnel an iron cone is put, resting on the funnel 
with three lugs, and with a clearance of half an inch. If the base 



\ l^ C3 r-i %■= tj r\ V~^ t V- 1 r-V 



<^ \^ <j <S> ^^ " Sc J2i PsO O O \V 




> ")-\.o N^^ \ K^ (^ 



C- Q V^, ^ V 



» (H .5. I o \' 



of the cone is eight inches in diameter, this will allow the right 
clearance. This cone is filled with gravel, which heats and keeps 
the cone warm, thus allowing the warm air to come in contact with 
a warm surface. The cone acts as a radiator, and it also prevents 
the chicks from falling down on top of the iron plate when the 
hover is ofif during the day. 

The sides of the upper section can be cut from i"xi2" surfaced 
redwood plank, and nailed to the flooring. The front (A, Fig. 19) 
is made from a piece of i"x9" redwood, with a hole cut in it to fit 
the glass ; this also is nailed to the sides and edge of the floor. The 
top (B, Fig. 19) is better made from redwood flooring, which, being 
tongued and grooved, will be tight, and prevent draughts. A piece 



54 



A PKACTICAL POULTRY PLANT 



of glass is fitted in the middle of it. The back (A, Fig. i8) has two 
side pieces nailed fast, B. B., and a framed glass C. which is fast- 
ened with a button on each side. This is taken out for convenience 
in cleaning. 

The lid ( D. Fig. i8) lifts off; do not hinge it, as it makes an 




,^ Ho <=■ o «. B^- fc.-r o vf 11. 



adjustable ventilator by leaving a larger or smaller space where it 
joins at E. 

A brooder should be well lighted, for the chicks shun a gloomy 
place, and prefer to remain out in the cold during the day, to going 
into a brooder that is warm, but dark; so I find it a good plan to 
have a pane of glass on top. in front, and at the back. It means a 




trifle more flame, as glass is a better conductor of heat than wood 
is ; but our chief idea is to have contented, happy chicks, even if it 
does take a little more oil. 

At first I used for a hover a circular piece of wood, with strips 
of felt nailed to the edge, and coming to within half an inch of the 



FOR SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA 



55 




^ , .-c.N^.'v ' '-^ ^ tegyr; vvs^ ' ■.bi^:%<g^TO~aa^ 



floor. I have discarded this for a better plan (Fig-. 23), 
which is a circle of galvanized iron 28" in diameter, and 
rising to a point in the middle, like a rather flat cone 
(B). From the rim a wall of iron comes down to the 
floor for one-third of the distance around, and opposite 
to it is a leg (C) for the open side to rest on. The wall 
rests in the sand, and goes in front of the entrance to 
the brooder, so that draughts strike the wall, behind 
which the chicks can lie snug and warm. The edge of 
the hover is 43^" above the floor, and the peak (B) is 8". 
Before I made this style of hover I noticed that the 
chicks always got away from the side of the funnel 
I^ ^ near the door, for the felt flaps did not keep the 
FIG. 23 draughts from going between and under them ; but now 
they settle in a circle all around the funnel. This funnel should 
have a few turns of felt or flannel wrapped around it, as it gets too 
warm for the chicks to lie close to. Change this covering from 
time to time, as it will get dirty. 

The hover has a hole in the top, through which a thermometer 





56 A PRACTICAL POULTRY PLANT 

can be put for the first couple of weeks. For a door, which is only 
required the first few nights, I find a shake laid against the opening 
cjuite sufficient. 

I use a "Cyphers' Brooder Stove" (Fig. 24) for each brooder; 
they cost $1.25 each, and are practically indestructible. Keep water 
in the pan under the oil and a good deal less oil will be burned, be- 
sides obviating any danger of explosion from gas, which generates 
in the oil chamber when it gets too hot. 

When "home made," these brooders complete, with lamp, cost 
about $10 each. 



FOK SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA 



57 



CHAPTER VIII. 



THE BROOD HOUSE 

The brood house contains a total of twelve brooders, four of 
which will be required for each hatch. Each brooder holds from 
fifty to sixty chickens, according to the size of the hatch. I have 
raised eighty chickens successfully in a similar brooder up to the 
age of six weeks, but I do not recommend so many, as they are 
apt to crowd. 

The floor of the brooder is covered half an inch deep with 
sand, or, if it is impossible to get sand, with soil. Each morning 




the sand is screened, and once a week fresh sand is put in, after 
scraping the floor and spraying it lightly with Lee's Lice Killer. 
Do this in the morning, so that the fumes will have partly escaped 
before night. A small frame of i"x3" pine with a bottom of or- 
dinary screen wire will do for screening the dirty sand ; this allows 
the sand to fall through, leaving the dirt in the screen. 

The inside yard (Fig. 25) in front of the brooder is covered 
about an inch deep with chafif, or clean chopped straw, which can 
be renewed at the end of three weeks, the second lot lasting until 
the chicks are ready to leave the brooder. 

Clean water should be given each morning when the brooders 
5 



58 



A PRACTICAL POULTRY PLANT 




are cleaned, and the water tins (Fig. 26) washed thoroughly with 

a round scrubbing brush ; at the end of 
the week all these tins must be boiled. 
A small grit jar is kept in each inside 
yard, filled with chicken grit and fine 
granulated charcoal. Both of these can 
be obtained from Henry iMber's Poul- 
try Supply House. The only safe char- 
coal to use is Willow charcoal, which 
contains less acid and tannin than the 
ordinary charcoal oi commerce. For 
the first week I prefer to feed the chick- 
'''°- ^^ ens on Croley's "Dry Chicken Feed." 

It can be bought for about four cents a pound by the hundred-pound 
sack, and two sacks will be enough for a thousand chickens. This 
food contains a great variety of small seeds, some grit, and some 
charcoal. Scatter a handful on the runway, and several more hand- 
fuls amongst the chafif; and, the first day only, a handful in the 
brooder, in the clean sand. 

The brooder lamps should be lighted several hours before the 
chicks are put in, and the temperature of the brooder under the 
hover should be from 95 to 100 degrees. I usually shift the chickens 
from the incubator to the brooder in a box with a sack covering 
the bottom, and another sack over the top of the box, to prevent 
their getting chilled. I prefer to shift them in the morning, so that 
the little ones can have all day to get used to their new quarters 
and learn to eat. If the weather is cold keep them in the brooder 
all the first day, the handful of seeds being sufficient for the first 
day's food ; if it is warm, sunny weather, go into the yard after a 
few hours, and tap on the runway with your finger, which will 
bring them scampering out to pick at your hand. You can then 
gradually coax them down into the straw, following your hand. 
All this is really not necessary, for if left alone they will come out 
a few at a time, and by afternoon nearly all will be scrambling and 
scratching amongst the straw for the seeds, and clustering around 
the water, drinking from the first. I advocate spending a few 
minutes amongst them several times a day, from the beginning; it 
makes tiiem tame and used to you ; otherwise, as soon as you go 
into the brood house they will flutter away in all directions, from 
fright. I must warn you against making any quick movements at 



FOR SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA 59 

any time, when near the birds, young or old ; and don't let others 
do it, either ; it frightens the birds ; and when once properly fright- 
ened, they are always afraid when any one is near them. 

In warm weather the lamps can be lowered during the day; 
and after the first day or two the hovers can be taken out at the 
morning cleaning and be put back about the middle of the after- 
noon. Do not clean the brooders too early, but let the morning get 
warm first ; and oil and trim the lamps from 3 to 4 p. m., before the 
day grows cool ; for the first week see that the chicks are all in the 
brooder by this time, and keep them in and draughts out, by put- 
ting a shake in front of the doorway, which can be removed in the 
morning to let them out. 

Towards the end of the first week mix a little cracked wheat 
with the prepared dry feed, gradually increasing the wheat until 
the fourth week, when it will be all cracked wheat ; then mix whole 
wheat with the cracked, so that at the end of the sixth week they 
will be eating all whole wheat. When the chicks are about ten 
days old, give a little of the following mixture every morning, but 
no more than they will eat up clean in ten or fifteen minutes. At 
first they will be dubious about it, but if left alone they will soon 
take it. As they grow older the quantity will have to be increased, 
but never give them so much that any is left on the plates an hour 
afterwards. With a scoop or measure thoroughly mix up the fol- 
lowing ingredients in a sufficient quantity to last several days or 
weeks. 

4 scoops bran, 

I scoop middlings, 

I scoop corn or feed meal, 

I scoop oatmeal, 

% scoop meat meal, 

I teaspoon salt. 

Mix with sweet or sour milk until it is crumbly but not wet, 
and feed at once before the meals sour. It is better to have it too 
dry than too wet. Feed it on small, shallow tin plates, putting 
three or four plates to each yard to prevent the chicks from 
crowding. 

[f this is fed in the morning, and at noon and evening, suffi- 
cient seed or wheat is thrown amongst the straw to keep them busy 
scratching all day, they will thrive, and grow big frames covered 
with firm flesh and little fat. 



60 A PRACTICAL POULTRY PLANT 

When I first started I used to spend a good deal of time feeding 
the chickens at fixed hours five or six times a day ; in fact, it some- 
times became a matter of coaxing to get them to eat ; and if I hap- 
pened to forget them, they simply "lay back and yelled." My log 
book shows a good deal of mortality in those days, under this cod- 
dling bill of fare ; whereas now the work of feeding is a mere bag- 
atelle, and the chicks are sturdy and busy all day looking for food 
which has to be looked for, before eaten. 

After the first four or five days, if the weather is warm, open 
the little door and let them out to the soil yard, and then, in a day 
or two more, they can be let into the alfalfa yard, if the dew is oflf 
the leaves. The soil yard should be hoed and raked every two or 
three weeks ; this keeps the soil sweet and crumbly, and induces the 
little chicks to take sun baths. It is very essential that the wee 
birds are kept from getting damp or wet ; so before opening the 
alfalfa yards make sure that the alfalfa is fairly dry. 

After the first week the temperature of the brooders may be 
gradually lowered and the use of the shake in front of the door be 
discontinued, until, by the end of the fourth or fifth week, the lamps 
can be put out and the chicks have a week or two of hardening 
before leaving the brooder. In warm weather, with the sun shining 
on the low, sloping roof of the brooder, the temperature of the 
brood-house will be high enough to allow the lamps to be out the 
greater part of the day, even with both doors and ventilators open. 
Keep a good thermometer hanging on the north wall of the brood- 
house, inside ; this will act as a guide for keeping the right heat. 
On hot days, leave the tops of the brooders open enough to let them 
air, and still keep the chickens from flying out. At night, when go- 
ing around for the last time, look through the brooder windows at 
the chicks and see if they are all right ; if they are crowding to- 
gether too much it means that they want more heat, but if they are 
all outside the hover it is because they are too warm ; remember, 
though, that the temperature generally drops several degrees be- 
tween ten p. m. and four a. m., and that it is better to have it a 
little too warm than too cold ; for they can always find a cool place 
close to the sides of the brooder, if the ventilation is good, and then 
as the temperature drops, they will gradually get closer to the 
center of the hover and when the early chill comes they will all be 
under the hover. This is the beauty of having good big brooders — 
not too crowded — where several temperatures can be found. 



FOR SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA 61 

After each batch of chickens, the brooder should be first 
scraped, then thoroughly washed out, and sprayed with Lee's Lice 
Killer, or some other good disinfectant ; the inner yards cleaned 
and sprayed ; and both brooders and yards whitewashed and the 
windows cleaned. I consider this an essential feature of the work, 
for after fifty or sixty chickens have been living in the brooder and 
yard for six weeks, even when the sand is sifted every morning and 
changed each week, there still is a pretty strong smell hanging 
around. If it is neglected, each successive lot of chicks will do 
worse, as the smells and dirt increase ; and a stunted chicken never 
really grows as strong or lays as well as the one that gets no set- 
back, but grows straight along from the first. 

When I hear about brooder chickens, or any chickens under 
five or six months of age that have been kept away from the grown 
hens and still have insects on them, I always consider it a grave 
reflection on the system of cleanliness and order practiced at that 
particular plant. After birds get matured they are very liable to 
get a few insects on them in this warm climate, even under the 
best conditions ; but there should be no excuse for young chickens, 
hatched in an incubator and brought up in brooders, being infested 
with them. 



62 



A PRACTICAL POULTKY PLANT 



CHAPTER IX. 



THE CHICKEN HOUSE 

By setting off an incubator every fifteen days, at the end of 
six weeks from the first hatch the twelve brooders will be full of 
chicks in three stages. There will be about two hundred at two 
weeks old, two hundred four weeks old, and two hundred six weeks 
old, with another lot nearly due. So it is time to shift the six weeks 
old birds to the chicken houses. 

These houses should have sand on the floors, and for the first 
week or two, especially if the weather is cold or wet, put a couple 
of inches of clean straw over the sand, turning it over each morning 
and changing it at the end of a week. The straw makes the place 
cozy and warmer than the cold sand. The chickens, having been 
used to the wood floor of the brooder, have to be gradually accli- 
mated to outside conditions. 

The chicken house has three low perches, and the birds will 
come by degrees to roosting at night until, at the end of the second 
week in their new home, all, or nearly all will be up, and the straw 
will be no longer necessary. 

Shift the chickens at night, putting the contents of one brooder 
in each house. The little openings in front of the houses have two 
slides each, one of wood and one of wire ; for the first few nights 




close the opening with the wooden slide ; afterwards, unless the 
night is very cold and wet, use the wire slide, until the birds are 
eight or nine weeks old, when no slide need be used unless the 
weather is rainy. While the birds are young it is important not to 



FOR SOUTHERN CALIFOKNIA 63 

let them get wet, so the wire sHde keeps them in until you 
see how the morning- looks. If it is going to be a wet day, better 
give them some straw with wheat or cracked corn scattered in, 
to keep them scratching and lively ; put in their drinking troughs 
(Fig. 2^), and keep them safely housed until the weather im- 
proves. 

On wet days I feed half cracked corn and half wheat ; the corn 
generates more heat than the wheat does, but if all corn is used 
the change of food is apt to disagree with them, so it is better to 
mix it with wheat, which they are used to. 

Instead of using plates for the mash, as in the brooders, use 
small wooden troughs (Fig. 28), which should be kept scrupu- 




lously clean. There are three sizes of grit sold, the small size for 
the brooder chicks, an intermediate size, and a large size. F]or 
these chickens use the intermediate size, mixed with granulated 
charcoal. Keep a jar or two of it in the yard all the time; nothing 
is better for keeping their digestive organs in good order tharf 
plenty of grit and charcoal. If enough mash is given them in the 
morning to satisfy them, with none left over, and some grairj 
always kept in a few inches of straw in one corner of the yard, the 
alfalfa will do the rest of the feeding necessary. 

The big alfalfa patch in each of these yards will be a source 
of food and exercise, and keep them busy all day long. The im- 
portance of the alfalfa patch is only realized, by keeping a flock of 
growing birds on bare ground, and another on alfalfa. The latter, 
with one half the attention that is bestowed on the bare ground 
lot, will in a given time be fully a third larger, and a good deal 
healthier. 

In fine weather, after cleaning the house, leave the hinged roof 
open and let the sun play in all day, until evening, when it can be 
closed at the same time that they get their grain. In the morning, 
when feeding the mash, clean and refill the water tin. Time, is 
valuable on a poultry plant ; therefore try to systematize the work, 
and save both time and footsteps whenever and wherever possible, 



04 A PRACTICAL POULTRY PLANT 

For cleaning the sand in these houses, make a frame like the 
one used in the brooders, only larger, and with a coarser meshed 
wire for the bottom. Once a week sweep out all the sand, scraping 
oflf any dirt that may have stuck to the cement, and spray the floor 
with Lee's Lice Killer before putting on clean sand. I use a small 
hoe with the handle cut down to about nine inches, for scraping. 
It is well always to have this hoe handy when cleaning, to loosen 
any dirt that may have stuck to the perches or floor. 

These houses are the only ones that have to be watched in 
case of the weather changing from fine to wet, during the day. If 
it looks like rain, run all the birds in and close the wire slide. A 
few drops, or a passing shower, will not hurt if the sun comes out 
warm afterwards ; but if it looks like steady rain, keep them in the 
house. To facilitate getting the birds in quickly at the approach 
of rain, the chicken houses are placed in corners of the yards; the 
birds being easily herded into the corner, and from there into the 
houses. 

Twelve weeks from the first hatch all the chicken houses will 
be full, as well as the brooders ; altogether, there should be twelve 
hundred birds, and the hatching finished. Of this young stock, 
about six hundred will be cockerels that will have to be sold as 
"broilers" at the age of twelve weeks. On no account try to keep 
them until they are older, as the difference in price will little more 
than balance the extra cost of keeping them ; besides, we now begin 
to need all the room for the pullets. So, when the first four flocks 
of fifty birds each are twelve weeks old, pick out the cockerels 
(they are easily known at this age by their longer legs and more 
highly developed combs) and sell them. The houses will then 
have only about twenty-five pullets in each ; put the birds of two 
houses into one, then clean and wash out the two empty houses, 
whitewash them, and get them ready again for brooder chicks. 
The yards should also be swept, and clean straw put in the cor- 
ners. When all is ready, take out half the birds from each of the 
brooders that have six weeks old chickens, selecting the strongest 
and best grown, and leave the rest to remain in the brooders until 
they are twelve weeks old. The hundred or so birds taken from the 
brooders are put fifty in each chicken house. This order of moving 
will have to be kept up until there is room in the big hen houses 
for the pullets, that is, until the old birds have been sold and the 
houses cleaned and whitewashed. 



FOR SOUTHERN CAI^IFOKNIA 65 

When birds are kept in the brood house over six weeks, the 
brooders should be closed, and small movable perches put in the 
inner yards for the birds to roost on, instead of going into the 
brooders at night. 

The foregoing is the routine and order of housing after the 
first year, when the hatching commences with a stock on hand of 
a thousand hens, half of which will be sold in the early fall, so that 
only five or six hundred pullets will be required to take their 
places. The hatching for the first year will have to be just double 
as all the hen yards have to be filled, and some thousand pullets 
are required. For this we shall have to have ten hatches of two 
hundred chicks each, or five months of hatching, instead of three 
months. In this case I consider June or July hatching excusable ; 
but under ordinary circumstances, do not hatch after May. The 
June and July birds will not get down to steady laying before 
February, which makes their laying season (to August) too short 
for the biggest profits. 

The chickens hatched during the first year will, therefore, 
have plenty of room ; and just as soon as they reach the age of 
twelve weeks, the pullets can be shifted to the hen houses, the 
cockerels sold, and the houses cleaned out and filled again from the 
brooders ; and the brooders, in turn, washed, cleaned, and refilled 
from the incubators. 

The mash for the six to twelve weeks old chickens is the same 
that the brooder chicks get ; only put double the quantity of meat 
meal in it, and mix it with water if there is not milk enough for 
both. Always give the youngest ones the benefit of the milk, when 
there is not enough to go around. 

When shifting the pullets to the hen yards, have a good pair 
of shears, and cut the feathers on one wing of each bird. At this 
age they are apt to fly like pigeons, and if put into the new yards 
without this precaution they will fly from yard to yard, and be a 
perfect nuisance ; but if the wing is cut they soon get used to their 
new quarters, and by the time the feathers have grown again they 
are contented, and a good deal heavier, and less likely to fly. 

This is the best time for culling the birds. Any that are de- 
formed, or have crooked backs or no tails, should be sold or eaten, 
but on no account kept. Our layers are our profit makers, and 
must be in perfect physical condition, or we shall be feeding two 
cents' worth of food for one cent's worth of eggs. This, of course, 



66 A PRACTICAL POULTRY PLANT 

does not apply to the plumage ; a few colored feathers will make 
no difference to the laying. 

I particularly wish to impress the importance of culling. 
"Keep no birds with physical defects if you want to succeed with 
poultry ;" this is a rule that should be painted in big letters and 
stuck up in the brood house, and also at the entrance to the chicken 
houses, and, above all, over the portals of the hen houses. I firmly 
believe that every deformed or poor, weak hen not only leaves no 
profit, but also eats the profit of one good, laying hen. Beware of 
making your establishment a home for incurables. A little study 
of this doctrine will make one more successful, if harder hearted. 

After all the chickens are out of the brood house and chicken 
yards, cut the alfalfa close to the ground with a grass-hook, or 
scythe, and keep it cut every month until just before hatching 
season opens the following year. The cut alfalfa can be fed fresh 
to the hen yards and will help out the lawn clippings. I use a 
"Mann's Clover Cutter," which cuts the alfalfa into short lengths, 
and if the alfalfa is cut while yovmg and tender, the hens will eat 
every particle of it. 

A doctor told me recently that if the first joint of one wing 
is cut off with a blunt pair of scissors, when the chicks are a day 
old, it will keep them from flying and not hurt them. 



FOR SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA 67 

CHAPTER X. 



THE HEN HOUSE 

These houses are large and airy, and will comfortably hold 
seventy-five hens. Except during a driving rain from the south, 
the flaps, which face south, are opened when cleaning in the morn- 
ing, and left open all day, until G:gg gathering time at night ; this 
insures a dry, sweet house. At night sufficient ventilation is 
afforded by the space around the roof, and the ventilation space 
at the back of the house near the top. Many advocate bottom ven- 
tilation, others an open space in front with a curtain of cheese- 
cloth or other light material. Some experts have considered my 
house far too small. My reply is that the birds kept in these houses 
are always healthy, lay well, and appear comfortable. My books 
show that I lose yearly from one to two per cent of grown birds, 
of which there are always at least a thousand on the place. With 
results like these, I consider it a good plan to let well enough alone. 
My theory is that in this climate, where the days are hot and the 
nights often twenty or thirty degrees colder, the birds require a 
fairly warm house at night, so that the ovitside difference in tem- 
perature is not felt inside the house. 

I have no scratching houses, and consider them, in our climate, 
an unnecessary nuisance. The birds are always laying amongst 
the straw, and when one has to gather on an average five hundred 
eggs a day in the busy season, it is quite enough work to take them 
from the nest boxes, without having to rummage through a lot of 
scratching sheds — to say nothing of the risk of finding stale eggs ; 
for every egg found amongst the scratching straw should be kept 
separate, and tested before being put with the market eggs. With 
two large yards, each 30x180 feet, to each house, and some trees 
or bushes for shade, the birds get all the exercise necessary, espe- 
cially if the grain is scattered well over the yard and not thrown 
down in a heap. 

Each yard raises a crop of wheat every year; some of this is 
eaten green, but a lot heads, and the birds jump up to get the ears 
and break down the stalks, covering the yard with a layer of heavy, 
coarse straw. 

The ground being so rich with the continual droppings, raises 
enormous crops of high, coarse straw, which lies over the soil 



68 A PRACTICAL POULTRY PLANT 

nearly all the year. This affords good, natural scratching, and 
being outside, seems to offer little or no inducement to the hens 
to steal their nests. Occasionally an egg is found, when scattering 
the grain, but not often. 

When the twelve weeks old pullets are first put into these 
houses no nest boxes are required ; they are therefore hung up to 
the rafters, out of the way. When they are needed, place them in 
position and put in each nest two or three inches of sand, and a 
nest egg. I prefer the medicated nest eggs. After the pullets have 
got used to the nests, these eggs can be taken out and kept for the 
following year. 

I found that outside nests were not as convenient as nests in the 
house. With the former in use, the hens often laid in corners of 
the house, and cracked eggs were very frequent ; but now it is a 
rare thing to get an egg outside of the nest. When gathering eggs, 
which is the last thing to do in the afternoon, any dirt or feathers 
found in the nest should be thrown out. A good plan is to empty 
the nests in two houses every week, on a given day, scrape off any 
dirt sticking to the bottom of the nests, spray them with Lee's Lice 
Killer, and fill up with fresh sand. In this way each nest is sure 
to be cleaned once in six weeks, and a habit is formed, which after 
a few times becomes natural and requires no further thought. 

The mash for the pullets and hens is much the same as for the 
chickens, with the addition of more meat meal, and ground oats 
and barley instead of oatmeal. 

4 scoops of bran, 

I scoop of middlings, 

I scoop of corn or feed meal, 

I scoop of ground oats (hull and all), 

I scoop of ground barley (hull and all), 

I scoop of meat meal, 

I ounce salt. 
In the feed house are bins, each holding several sacks of the 
above articles, and one large bin, sufficient to hold about a ton of 
the dry mixture. I usually fill this bin with the mixture, putting 
in a bucket or big scoopful of each ingredient in turn, and then 
thoroughly mix with a hoe, until the bin is full. This quantity will 
last about a month and no time is lost in the morning; all that is 
necessary is to take so many buckets of the mixture and wet it with 
water in the mixing box, a box 4 feet long, 18 inches wide and 12 



FOR SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA 69 

inches high. After the box is empty, tip it up in the sun to dry and 
sweeten, and once a week wash it out very clean. Be sure not to 
make this mash wet; have it just crumbly, no more. 

The water tins should be placed in the shade, and be large 
enough to hold sufficient water for twenty-four hours. One tin 
to each yard is enough ; when refilling, wash it out with a scrubbing 
brush, even if it looks clean. Fresh, cool water, and plenty of it, 
is most necessary, for over sixty per cent of the egg is water, and 
a shortage of water inevitably means a shortage of eggs. 

The green food — either chopped fresh alfalfa or fresh clip- 
pings from the clover lawn — is better relished at noon than at any 
other time. I find that when I can feed plenty of green stuff, there 
are more and better flavored eggs, and a big saving on the mash 
and wheat. Besides, this bulky kind of food is necessary in keeping 
the digestive organs in good working condition. 

The wheat is best fed at three p. m., scattering it well and 
giving a little more than can be eaten that night. Some grains are 
then left to be hunted for in the morning, keeping the birds busy 
and giving them a good appetite by mash time. 

At the beginning of the rains, some cracked corn should be 
bought — not more than a ton at a time, as it deteriorates after 
being cracked or ground. On rainy days, mix half cracked corn 
and half wheat for the night feed, and if it is raining at feed time, 
instead of scattering it, put it into the feed trough, so that the 
birds can get it quickly and go back to the shelter of the house, out 
of the rain. During the rainy season I put a few drops of ''Pacific 
Roup Cure" in the water, just enough to slightly color it. This 
preparation has a carbolic basis, and although I have never had the 
slightest approach to roup amongst the fowls, 1 believe in using 
a preventive during the season when colds are most prevalent. 
This carbolic acid makes the water look soapy, and care must be 
taken not to put too much in, or else the birds will refuse to drink it. 

In emptying the water from the tins when cleaning them, 
scatter it, so that no puddles accumulate on the ground ; the fowls 
curiously prefer these dirty puddles to the clean water in the tins. 

I will give an outline of the average day's work in the hen 
yards, of which, on my place, there are twelve. 

Seven a. m. The morning's ration of dry feed is put in the 
mixing trough and thoroughly mixed with water to a crumbly 
mass, which is then left to soak until feed time. The man then 



70 



A PRACTICAL POULTRY PLANT 



takes his big wheelbarrow, containing a bucket of clean sand, a 
small short-handled hoe, a short-handled corn broom, and a dust 
pan (Fig. 29) made of strong galvanized iron after the model used 




by street sweepers ; he goes to the first house, opens the flap to let 
the sun in, and then lightly sweeps the droppings under the 
perches into the dust pan, using the hoe where anything has stuck, 
either to the floor or perch. With practice, all the manure is taken, 
but very little sand. A few handfuls of sand are then sprinkled on 
the bare places on the cement floor. This is repeated in each house, 
and it takes from an hour to an hour and a half to do the twelve 
houses, according to the expertness of the cleaner. 

The Leghorns are naturally high strung, nervous birds and 
great care must be exercised to avoid frightening them. Open the 
flap and door gently, and if any birds are still in the house, shoo 
them out without startling them. When sweeping, move quietly, 
so as not to disturb the birds on the nests. The lid of the nest 
boxes prevents them from seeing anything of the cleaner except his 
boots, for even different colored clothes, such as white trousers one 
day and dark the next, is sufficient to upset these nervous little 
creatures ; so make the cleaner get into the habit of moving quietly, 
whenever near the yards. A man that persistently forgets this, and 
frightens the birds, should be dismissed in spite of other good 
qualities ; for birds that are afraid of their care-taker will lay from 
twenty-five to fifty per cent less eggs than they otherwise would. 

The sand 'box is conveniently placed for refilling the buckets, 
as three or four are required before the cleaning is finished. After 
the cleaning, the manure is screened free of the sand, which is 
wheelbarrowed to a dump, and the manure thrown into the com- 
post house. 



FOR vSOUTHERN CALIFORNIA 



71 



By 8:30 the cleaning is finished, dirty sand thrown away, and 
manure stored. The mash is now put into buckets and wheeled to 
the first yard, where so many scoops of it are put in each of the 
four troughs (Fig. 30). When in the yards, talk to the birds; the 



F\ t V ^J >_ V > I ^ (i' 




RcH 



sound of the voice reassures them, especially at feeding time. Any 
idiotic sound will do, so long as it is not too loud, and bears a slight 
resemblance to their own crooning. I have often stood in front of 
the house, talking gibberish to them, and after a little while have 
had every hen answering me back. While feeding, keep your eye 
lifting to note how the birds look, and if there is a droopy one, pick 
her up quickly and put her alone somewhere. 

By 9:30 the feeding is finished and the feed room swept out. 
Sufficient clover is then mown, or alfalfa cut with a grass hook, and 
run through the Mann Clover Cutter, and put in buckets ready 
for use at noon. Odd jobs are then done until eleven o'clock, when 
the birds get their clover, and the water tins are cleaned and re- 
filled. These two things are done at the same time, to avoid extra 
steps, the man entering the yard with a bucket of water and another 
of green stufif. . This is a good time to gauge the right quantity of 
mash for the morning feed. If the birds appear very hungry, feed 
a little more mash next time ; 6r if some still remains in the troughs, 
feed less. Some of the yards will require more, or less, than the 
others, at different times. Keen observation is the only true guide 
to the correct quantity to be fed, as it varies all the time. 

It will now be noon, and time for lunch. In the afternoon 
odd jobs can be idone, such as gardening, keeping the paths in 
order, etc., until 3 p. m., when the wheelbarrow is loaded with 
buckets of wheat and taken to the yards. So many scoops are 



72 A PRACTICAL POULTRY PLANT 

well scattered in each yard, an eye being kept well open for stray 
eggs laid in the yards. After feeding, which, in order to get 
the wheat thoroughly scattered, takes about an hour, the eggs are 
collected in chip baskets holding not more than fifty or sixty eggs 
each. Any dirt or feathers found in the nests is taken out, and in 
the case of a badly broken egg, the soiled sand is replaced with 
clean. The eggs must be handled very carefully to avoid breakage, 
and any broody hens found in the nests are gently lifted out and 
put in the jail, where they stay for four days. The greatest care 
must be exercised in handling hens, for an egg broken inside means 
sure death in a few days. As the eggs from each house are gath- 
ered close the flap for the night. 

By the time the eggs are gathered, brought to the feed house, 
the dirty ones cleaned, and all packed in cases ready for shipment, 
it will be about 5 :30, and the day's work at an end. But I take a 
stroll around right after dinner, to see that everything is in order, 
and no hens are outside the yards, or roosting in the trees. A cold, 
damp night will give a left out hen a cold, which may quickly spread 
to the others, with serious results. 

All this, of course, applies to the work of the twelve hen yards 
only. The chicken yards and brooders are extra, but are only in 
use for part of the year, whereas the hen yards are always full. 

In each house is a grit box (Fig. 31) that is 
always kept full of grit, shell, and willow 
charcoal, all of which are absolutely neces- 
sary to the general health of the birds. 

The photograph, "Gathering eggs," shows a 
house with the flap open and the opening 
covered with wire netting on the inside, 
to keep the hens from coming out. 

The "jail" is also shown close to the 
nest box from which I am gathering 
eggs ; it is fastened to the end of the 
house and at the back a small opening, 
just large enough for a hen to get through, 
is cut into the main hen house, and a small door is hinged to the top 
of the opening, a wire is made fast to the bottom of the door and 
the end brought out to the front of the jail ; after the birds have 
been confined for four days the door is opened by pulling the wire 
and the birds fly through the opening into their house. By this 
means we only handle the fowls once instead of twice. 




FOR SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA 73 

Leghorns are called "non-setters," but I find that if they feel 
broody and are allowed to stay on the nest for one night, they are 
harder to break up than many of the so-called "setters." I therefore 
make it a rule to carefully put in jail any hens found on the nests 
when gathering eggs ; after dinner I stroll around and make sure 
that all the nests are empty. 

The nest boxes are conveniently arranged and can be got at 
without entering either the house or the yards, and the jail of each 
house is placed near the nests of that particular house. I have put 
the door of each house at the other end, to be as far away from the 
nests as possible. 

The floor of the jail is a movable grating, that can be taken out 
once a week and washed ; it also allows the cool air to come 
through to the hen, which helps to break up the fever much quicker 
than if the floor were air tight. When cleaning the gratings, each 
week, the droppings under the gratings are swept up at the same 
time. 

This style of jail is my own idea and is both a convenience and 
a time saver. 



74 A PRACTICAL POULTRY PLANT 

CHAPTER XI. 



THE YEAR'S WORK 

I think a brief summary of the year's work will give an idea 
of the various phases of our poultry plant. 

We will suppose that it is about the beginning of November. 
Six of the hen houses are full of hens just over the moult, and be- 
ginning to lay a few eggs. The other six houses are full of pullets, 
ranging from five to eight months old ; some of these have been 
laying for the last six or eight weeks, and are now settling down to 
steady work. All of the brooders and ten of the chicken houses 
are empty. The last of the cockerels have been sold some time 
since, all except twenty-four of the oldest and finest, which are 
occupying the other two chicken houses, getting ready for the 
mating season. 

The rains are due now, and as soon as two or three inches have 
fallen the twelve empty hen yards are ploughed and sowed to 
wheat. Use a quiet horse and a small plough, taking care not to 
bark the trees. After the ground is well ploughed, sow the wheat 
rather thick and cultivate it in with a spring toothed cultivator. I 
prefer this to a harrow, as it softens the ground to a greater depth 
than if a harrow were used. The grovmd near the houses can be 
done with a spade and rake; this leaves a neater job. 

It will take six to eight days to do this work in a thorough 
manner, and it often pays to have it done by an outside man, so 
that no time and precious rains are lost. 

I have experimented with oats, barley, millet, rye and wheat, 
and found that wheat has the strongest tap root ; the fowls can 
pick and pull at it without destroying it, as it is impossible for them 
to pull it up. With the other cereals, they no sooner pull at the 
stalk than up comes the root ; they then drop it and pull up another 
and so on, until, in a week or two, it is all pulled up and lying dry 
on the ground. 

At this time all the brooders and chicken houses can be washed 
out and thoroughly cleaned, then whitewashed. This is good work 
for rainy days, as it is all under cover. Before I forget, let me say 
that after the last chickens are taken out of the brooders and 
chicken houses, do not leave the dirt and sand lying around in them 
until the rains come, but sweep them out and scrape ofif every par- 



FOR SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA 75 

tide of dirt from floor and perches : they can then be closed until 
the time comes for cleaning and whitewashing. 

Several days before the whitewashing, I get some leaves of the 
common cactus, chop them up and fill an ordinary kerosene barrel 
about a quarter full with them, filling up with water. A barrel of 
the best lime is bought, and until finished is always kept in a dry 
place, with some empty sacks stuffed in it to keep out the moisture. 
Some empty coal oil cans, with the heads cut out and strong wire 
handles put in, make good buckets ; whitewash spoils iron, so I do 
not use the good galvanized feed and water buckets for this pur- 
pose. The night before I am going to whitewash, a couple of 
buckets are half filled with lime, and then nearly filled up with 
water ; in the morning the lime is found slacked, and in fine con- 
dition for mixing. Take some of it in the bucket you are going to 
use. add a tablespoonful of salt and enough water to make a thin 
paste ; stir it well vmtil free from lumps, and then fill up to the 
right consistency with the cactus water, which will be thick and 
gluey, and takes the place of sizing, preventing the wash from rub- 
bing off; the salt makes the wash a pure white. 

I have used a pump to spray the whitewash on, but find a large 
brush much better for this work. The wash had to be strained 
through a fine mesh before it could be used in a pump, and after 
the job was finished a good deal of wash was found where it was 
not wanted — on the green paint — and had to be washed off ; so the 
pump was condemned. 

In Januar}' the cockerels can be mated with the hens, putting 
five or six in each of the finest yards. Towards the end of this 
month the yards that were sown to wheat will be ready for use, 
the wheat being two or three feet high. At night shift the feed 
troughs and water tins into the fresh yards and open the small 
doors leading into them, closing the others. In the morning the 
birds will swarm into their new pastures, and in a few days quite 
a difference will be noticed in the egg production. The empty 
yards should now be ploughed and sown as quickly as possible, to 
give the new crop every chance while the rains last. Towards the 
middle of February all the cleaning, whitewashing and odds and 
ends should be finished and the place in first-class order, before 
the busy season commences : for everything that can be done 
should be finished before March. 

Commence selecting eggs for hatching about February ist, 



76 A PRACTICAL POULTRY PLANT 

and on the 7th set off the first incubator, so that the first hatch will 
come off on March ist. Arrange to have a hatch due on the first 
and fifteenth of each month until May ist. If for any reason one 
or two poor hatches are experienced, it will be necessary to con- 
tinue hatching until the fifteenth of May or even the first of June, 
but on no account hatch later ; better sell fewer hens that year, so 
as to make up for the smaller supply of pullets. 

From the first hatch on, the work will gradually increase until 
the end of May, when everything will be at its busiest. Every 
brooder, chicken house and hen house will be full. In addition to 
the thousand hens, there will be twelve hundred chickens to care 
for and feed. No holidays or Sundays off should be taken while 
there is young stock on hand ; it is better to wait until later, for be- 
sides being the busy season, it is also the time when most money is 
made. In addition to the eggs, there should be seven or eight dozen 
young cockerels to dispose of each fortnight from the first of May 
until July. Fortunately the days are long at this time, so that 
work can be started at six o'clock instead of seven, and continued 
when necessary, after dinner. 

Towards the end of July the eggs will have fallen off very con- 
siderably, and it will be time to arrange a market for the sale of the 
five hundred hens. Try to sell them at the rate of a hundred a 
week, and before they begin to moult in earnest. As each house is 
emptied, give it a first class wash and whitewash, and sweep away 
all dirt from around the house, and have things in order for the 
new pullets. The nest boxes will not be wanted for some time, and 
can be hung up to the rafters, out of the way. As soon as each 
house is cleaned, fill it up with young pullets. 

By August, the five hundred hens that are to be kept over for 
a second season will begin to stop laying, and from now on through 
their moult will have to be carefully watched. The moulting sea- 
son is a precarious time for birds, unless they are well cared for. 
From the beginning of August until the end of the moult, when 
they are laying again, I mix in all the mash a tonic called "Myers' 
Royal Poultry Spice." It is good for the pullets as well, and gets 
them into good condition for laying. I have tried several different 
kinds of condiments, but get the best results from the above. If the 
birds are kept in good health by being properly housed, yarded and 
fed, no condiment or tonic should be necessary, except at the 
moulting period for hens, and perhaps for pullets just before they 
come to laying age. 



FOR SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA 77 

I consider nothing is more to be avoided than to be always 
doctoring and dosing the birds. If one of the flock looks droopy, 
separate it from the others for a few days and give it a little extra 
care. Mix a little of the Poultry Spice in its food, and put a few 
drops of the Pacific Roup Cure in its water. If this does not im- 
prove it, "oiT with its head," and bury it deep. I mentioned before 
that in rainy weather I use a few drops of this roup cure in the wa- 
ter, twice a week, as a preventive for colds. If a bird looks really 
sick, do not hesitate to kill it at once and bury it deep. It is better 
to kill a hundred than to have a thousand sick ones. Again, if a hen 
has been pretty sick, and you nurse her through, be sure not to 
breed from her, for this tendency to catch cold can be transmitted 
to the next generation. 

By October, all the young stock should be housed in the hen 
houses, except a couple of dozen of the early hatched and choicest 
cockerels, that stay in two of the chicken houses until fully grown 
and ready for mating in January. 

Now the heavy work is about over for the season. The pullets 
will be thinking of laying, and the hens will have most of their new 
clothes on. As soon as the moult is finished, you will notice that 
the combs of the hens grow very small and pale, and remain so for 
nearly a month. Not an egg will they lay while in this condition, 
although during the heavy part of the moult they give a few, even 
when they are almost bare of feathers. I suppose that at the finish 
all their vitality is drained, and they have to recuperate, and hence 
want a nourishing tonic — not a stimulant — to encourage eggs. 

By this time the owner of the plant will probably begin to feel 
as if he, also, wanted a tonic and a rest for a few weeks. 



78 A PRACTICAL POULTRY PLANT 

CHAPTER XII. 



SUPPLIES 

A few words on the subject of food will not be amiss. For 
convenience in reference, I will again enumerate the mixed mashes 
that I use for the birds. 

Brooder Chickens, From One to Six Weeks, 

4 parts (by measure) bran, 

I part oatmeal. 

I part middlings, 

I part feed or corn meal, 

y^ part meat meal, 

I teaspoon salt. 

Chicken House Chickens, From Six to Twelve Weeks. 

4 parts bran, 

I part ground oats (husks and all), 

I part ground barley (husks and all), 

I part middlings, 

I part feed or corn meal, 

y2 part meat meal, 

I ounce salt. 

Pullets and Hens, From Twelve Weeks Up. 
4 parts bran, 
I part ground oats, 
I part ground barley, 
I part middlings, 
I part feed or corn meal, 
I part meat meal, 
I ounce salt. 
I mix the mash for the chickens with milk, and would use it for 
all the mashes if I had it, or were situated near a dairy ; but as it 
is, I have to use water when the milk fails. 

Do not mix over night, as the mash sours, and is not good for 
the birds ; mix the first thing in the morning, and it will then get 
an hour's soaking before being fed. 

The wheat I buy in August, or as soon as the thrashing is 
finished. I get twenty-five tons then, which just lasts the year. 



FOR SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA 79 

Usually it costs from $22 to $25 laid on the place. It is not neces- 
sary to buy what is called milling wheat, or shipping wheat, which 
is clean and plump, and free from other grains ; in fact, I do not 
care for plump wheat, as it contains more starch than is necessary 
for the birds. I try to get small parched wheat, that has five or 
ten per cent of oats or barley mixed with it, but is perfectly sweet 
and sound ; it costs considerably less than milling wheat. On no 
account buy smutty or unsound wheat at any price, unless you 
want sick hens. 

The store house is large enough to permit the wheat to be 
stored in several piles, which enables one to examine it occasion- 
ally, to see that it is not sweating. I always put some pieces of 
old board under the sacks, as cement sometimes gets a little damp 
when the air is cut ofif from it. 

The bran, middlings, feed meal, ground oats, ground barley 
and meat meal are better bought a ton each at one time. This 
especially applies to feed meal, which deteriorates after being 
ground a month or so. The usual price for these articles is as 
follows : 

Bran, $20 to $24 per ton. 

Middlings, $25 to $35 per ton. 

Feed meal, $35 to $40 per ton. 

Ground oats, $30 to $35 per ton. 

Ground barley, $22 to $26 per ton. 

Meat meal, $35 to $40 per ton. 

All of these except the last are bought direct at the mill ; the 
meat meal I buy from the "Agricultural Chemical Works," 901 
Macy Street, Los Angeles. This meat meal is tankage, especially 
prepared for poultry and contains cooked blood, bones and meat 
ground fine. I used to use fresh ground bones which I got from the 
butcher and ground myself in a "Mann's Bone Cutter," run by a 
small gasoline engine. I fed two hundred birds for a year with the 
freshly ground bone, and another two hundred with meat meal. 
Careful count was kept of the eggs from the two flocks, and at the 
end of the experiment there was a difiference of twenty-three eggs 
in favor of the ground bone ! I felt a trifle sad to think of all the 
extra and disagreeable work I had done for those miserable twen- 
ty-three eggs, and promptly discarded fresh bones, in spite of the 
many glowing reports of other people's results. It is a fine thing to 
keep a careful and reliable record. 



80 A PRACTICAL POULTRY PLANT 

The "Dry Chick Feed" is a mixture of many seeds with grit 
and charcoal ; I prefer the kind sold by G. H. Croley, 508 Sacra- 
mento Street, San Francisco. It costs $4 a hundred, and two hun- 
dred pounds is sufficient, with the help of cracked wheat, for the 
season's hatching. 

Grit, shell, willow charcoal, and everything else in the way of 
supplies I get from Henry Albers, 315 South Main Street, Los An- 
geles. I keep his catalogue handy ; anything that I require, not 
mentioned in the catalogue, he gets for me. 

Cotton seed meal costs about $40 a ton. During the moult, I 
use in the mash, instead of one part meat meal, I/2 part meat meal 
and Yz part cotton seed meal, as it has a lot of oil in it, and in my 
opinion is a great help to the moult. 

The tonic that I use during the moult is called "Myers' Royal 
Poultry Spice ;" I feed it according to the directions, and buy it in 
lots of one hundred pounds at a time. It is a mixture of ground 
herbs, and, with me, has proved the best tonic I have ever used. 
I get it from the agents, "The Keystone Milling Co.," San Pedro 
Street, Los Angeles. 

When the hay is cut I buy two or three tons of a good quality, 
and store it in the store house, ready for use during the hatching 
season. Egg cases, incubators, water tins, grit tins, "Union Lock" 
wire, in fact, nearly all of the fixtures required, can be got through 
H. Albers. I am afraid this looks like a puff for Mr. Albers, but it 
is not, in the way of business ; simply a recognition of good service 
rendered, at fair prices. 

One should take a paper or two, just to see what others are 
doing. Often they contain nothing that is particularly interesting 
to the commercial poultry man, but sometimes one comes across an 
article that is worth the year's subscription price several times over. 
For instance. Dr. Wood's brooder article in FARM POULTRY 
was worth paying the subscription to that paper for the rest of my 
life, even if I never got another idea from it. 

A thing I object to in many of our poultry papers, and that one 
must be on guard against, is the way articles and letters are al- 
lowed insertion without being first edited by a competent poultry- 
man ; a lot of misleading nonsense is written that in many cases is 
accepted and acted on, as sound knowledge, by the novice. 

The principal California papers that may prove interesting 
and of value to the rancher are as follows : 



FOR SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA 81 

The "CALIFORNIA CULTIVATOR" (weekly). This con- 
tains departments for pouUry, grarden, orchard, stock, etc. ; also the 
''Produce Market" quotations. I find this paper invaluable to one 
living in the country. 

The "LIVE STOCK TRIBUNE" (monthly). Strictly a stock 
paper, in which are articles from the principal breeders of fancy 
stock in this state. 

The "RURAL CALIFORNIAN" (monthly). This is prin- 
cipally devoted to horticulture, irrigation, and kindred subjects. 

The "FANCIER'S MONTHLY." The oldest paper of its 
kind in the state, and, I believe, an authority in the fancy trade. 

"FARM POULTRY" (semi-monthly), Boston, Mass. This 
is an eastern paper, and by some, might be considered out of place 
here. I like it for several reasons, the principal one being that the 
editor is a practical poultryman, and carefully edits pretty well 
everything that goes into the paper. He is severely practical, and 
ruthlessly expresses his opinion on everything that savors too 
much of the optimistic amateur. He is the author of "Poultry- 
Craft," which is in my estimation the standard work of its class, in 
this or any other country. Although I do not consider myself quite 
an amateur in commercial poultry, and think that I know more 
about our local conditions than Mr. Robinson, of "FARM POUL- 
TRY," I am quite prepared to accept in the right spirit any criti- 
cism that he may see fit to write on this book of mine, for I know 
that he will be just, if severe. 

"THE FARM POULTRY DOCTOR," by the above publish- 
ing company, is a good book to have on hand in case of sickness 
amongst the flock. 

"DISEASES OF POULTRY," by Dr. Salmon, is also an au- 
thority on the subject. 



82 A PRACTICAL POULTRY PLANT 

CHAPTER XIII. 



FOOD VALUES 

The chicken raiser generally passes through a "balanced ra- 
tion" period and at the end of it, in his inmost heart, feels that "he 
don't know where he are." When I was recovering from my dose 
of it, which lasted for over a year, I happened to see the following 
article by Doctor Woods in "Farm Poultry," and felt so impressed 
by its strong common sense, that I take the liberty to reproduce 
it for the benefit of others. 

FOWLS AND FOOD 



THE LIVING FOWL" ITS FOOD AND WHAT IT DOES WITH IT-- A LITTLE PHYSIOLOGY 
BOILED DOWN FOR POULTRYMEN 

The living fowl is often likened to a machine, but the compari- 
son is hardly just to such a wonderful complex organism as the 
living body. It is more like a living city peopled by a myriad of 
living cells, each with its duty to perform. There is a great supply 
system for receiving food and fuel, the digestive and respiratory 
organs, which with the tissues also represent great manufacturing 
plants capable of converting food and fuel into heat, work and 
building materials for the repair, maintenance or development of 
various parts of the body. With these manufacturing plants are 
intimately connected great store-houses to be called on in time of 
need, like fat tissue and the liver. There is a great system of trans- 
portation, the circulatory system, for carrying supplies and some 
workers to various parts of the body, and returning waste products 
to the excretory organs. Then the nervous system which has its 
sub-stations and telegraph lines communicating with all parts of 
the body, and which governs, polices, and regulates the whole. 
Presiding over all is something supreme, and about which we know 
next to nothing — life. 

It is not strange that in attempting to convert this wonderful 
living body — the like of which we have no power to create, but 
which possesses the ability to reproduce itself — into a machine we 
meet with obstacles which we fail to understand the meaning of. 
The wonder is that we succeed in controlling it and making it serve 
us as well as we do. 



FOR SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA 83 

The body is made up of an infinite number of living cells and 
their productions. These cells have varied duties to perform, and 
while some are confined to their special department and are gifted 
only with passive movement, there are others more active which 
travel all over the body. All are concerned in the maintenance of 
the body. Some of the active cells act as an army to repel invaders 
which appear in the form of disease germs. A few cells may neglect 
their duty and no harmful result is apparent, but let a number of 
cells combine, like the strikers in organized labor, and there is 
trouble until the dissatisfied population is put to rights again. 

Chemically the body is made up of water, protein, fats, mineral 
matter and some carbohydrates (starches and sugars, these ap- 
pearing chiefly as stored fuel manufactured from food). Accurate 
knowledge of the chemical compounds which exist in the living 
body and their exact disposition and relation to each other is im- 
possible, as in order to make an analysis the complex living matter 
must be killed and broken down, leaving only the debris for ex- 
amination. Accurate knowledge of the changes which take place 
during the digestion and assimilation of the food is likewise im- 
possible, as we must first kill the fowl or induce an unnatural con- 
dition, before it is possible to observe what is going on within it. 
Obviously much must be left to be drawn from theory. The theo- 
ries, however, are ably supported by the result of careful experi- 
ments based upon them. It is possible to prepare food of known 
chemical composition, and after feeding the same and making 
analysis of the waste disposed of, to estimate the amount of each 
constituent of the food digested. But the conditions governing the 
experiment are necessarily artificial, and the results do not show 
how the fowl disposes of what it digests or that a fowl would digest 
a like proportion of the food under normal conditions. The fact 
that the experimenter is dealing with a complex living organism 
subject to influences of which he has little or no accurate knowl- 
edge make it difficult to approach anything like exactitude in re- 
sults. A skillful experimenter may "prove" almost anything he 
sets out to demonstrate to his own satisfaction when handling live 
stock. He can show that under certain conditions, with certain 
fowls and certain methods he obtained such results, but another 
man with different fowls may follow his lead as exactly as it is 
possible for him to do, and the results will be widely different. 

It has been demonstrated by experiment with animals that the 



84 A PRACTICAL POULTRY PLANT 

difference in individuals in the proportion of the food digested of a 
given ration is not as great as is popularly supposed. Several in- 
dividuals of the same variety might "digest" a like amount of the 
different constituents of a ration, but the disposal each would make 
of the digested matter would vary widely. One might make heat 
or fat of it where another converted it into eggs or meat. The dis- 
posal of the digested matter will vary from time to time, "nature" 
choosing as she elects, and an exactly balanced ration that will 
cover all conditions and meet all individuals on a common ground 
from day to day is an impossibility. To balance a ration as ac- 
curately as some folks would have us believe they do it, would re- 
quire the gift of second sight and a daily change in the nutritive 
ratio of the ration. 

Such finickyness is not necessary or desirable. The chemical 
analysis of a food is of value only as it shows us the make up of the 
food, and saves us from feeding an excess of costly unnecessary 
material. In the majority of cases we cannot have an analysis of 
each lot of food purchased (even if desirable) and are obliged to 
depend on the average chemical composition for that particular 
food stuff. A glance over analysis tables of U. S. government re- 
ports will show that even the grains vary widely with the different 
samples of the same grain examined. As a rule it is safe to accept 
the whole grains at the average nutritive ratio set for them. With 
ground foods and meat foods, when trouble appears in a flock from 
unaccountable causes, it will be well to look carefully into the com- 
position of these manufactured food stuffs and see if therein can be 
found a cause for the trouble. 

The man who spends his time figuring out a chemically bal- 
anced ration, and wearies his brain with nutritive ratios and poten- 
tial energies will not, in nine cases out of ten, be anything like as 
successful as the man who studies his fowls and feeds them ac- 
cording to their appetites on good plain food in variety. 

It is essential that food shall be pure, palatable and digestible. 
A food may show an "ideal" chemical composition and yet be 
neither palatable or digestible. So far as the daily balance of the 
ration is concerned it is safer to leave that to the instinct of the 
fowl than to man's invention. The fowl's appetite is not an in- 
fallible guide, but if the fowl be given a fair chance to select its 
own food it can be depended upon to do fully as well as when it is 
provided with an elaborate man-concocted mixture. 



FOR SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA 85 

Chemists and physiologists have demonstrated some things 
about feeding that appeal to common sense. It has been shown 
that the body is made up chiefly of water, protein, mineral matter 
and fats. The carbohydrates appear also, but chiefly as stored ma- 
terial (fuel). We know also that foods contain these compounds. 

Water is supplied in the food and as drink. We don't have to 
pay further attention to that than to make sure that the fowls al- 
ways have a supply of pure water for drinking purposes. 

Protein is the most valuable constituent of food. Animal pro- 
tein (contained in meat food) is considered more available and 
more perfectly digestible than vegetable protein. It has been shown 
that some animal food is necessary to health. How it differs from 
vegetable protein we do not know, but vegetable matter will not 
completely take the place of animal matter. Protein besides being 
the most valuable is the most costly. It also has the widest range 
of uses within the body. Its chief value is as a tissue builder. It 
furnishes material for tissue building and repair, and contributes 
largely to the manufacture of eggs. It is also convertible into fat 
and heat. The waste from protein is more dangerous and more 
difficult to get rid of than that of other food constituents, so that 
aside from an economical point of view, it is unwise to feed a very 
narrow (excessively nitrogenous) ration. 

Carbohydrates are chiefly heat producing. They supply fuel, 
energy, to be converted into work and heat. It is doubtful if the 
carbohydrates are available for any other purpose. It is thought 
that they cannot be converted into fat, but act rather as a fat saver 
by furnishing fuel to be consumed in place of fat. Ducks fed 
abundantly on rice, which contains much carbohydrate and little 
protein or fat, remain lean ; if fat is added to the food they lay on 
fat. The liver, besides manufacturing bile for use in digesting and 
assimilating food, seems to act as a manufactory and storehouse 
of partially converted carbohydrates, and it deals them out in the 
form of a starch that is readily convertible into a sugar easily as- 
similated by the tissues. Where carbohydrates are greatly in ex- 
cess, a too starchy diet, the liver is overtaxed, and we get so called 
"liver troubles." 

The fats are available for energy, for work and heat, and may be 
stored for future use, or so disposed of as to be of service as in- 
sulators to protect the body against too rapid loss of heat. They 
serve as fuel for growing and working cells. The fats are carried 
to the cells in the form of minute fat droplets and undergo chemical 



86 A PRACTICAL POULTRY PLANT 

changes within the cells before being deposited in storage as fat 
tissue. The fats also contribute to egg formation. 

Mineral matter is necessary to supply the tissues, form bone, 
and supply mineral matter for eggs and material for egg shell. 

Oxygen from the air inhaled is taken up by the blood when 
passing through the lungs, and is carried to the tissues to help in 
the chemical changes which occur there. 

There are other things necessary to properly supply the living 
body. There is something that is not contained in dry grain or 
meat food especially if the food be cooked. Live fresh green food 
is necessary to the health of the fowl. There is something contained 
in the live cells of fresh green stufif that possesses health giving, 
disease preventing properties. We do not know what that some- 
thing is, but we know that it is there and that it is necessary. 
Cooking the food destroys the live cells and does not add anything 
to the food except bulk, and renders the starch more easily digesti- 
ble. The cooking is chiefly of service in adding variety to the food 
and in destroying any undesirable germs which may be present in 
the meat food. 

The true digestion of the food does not take place in the crop, 
stomach, gizzard, and intestines alone. It takes place all over the 
body, in the tissues. Suppose the bird to have been fasting. Food 
is taken into the crop, and the activity of that organ in supplying 
fluids to soften the food at once starts heat generation. The mus- 
cular contractions used to force the food onward also make heat. 
Heat production increases rapidly as the work of digestion pro- 
gresses. After the food is reduced to paste by grinding in the giz- 
zard and mixing with the secretions of the stomach, the intestines, 
the liver and pancreas, it is taken up by the circulation and carried 
all over the body to the tissues. There it undergoes chemical 
transformation, and its potential energy is further converted into 
kinetic energy in the form of work and heat. That portion of the 
food not available for the needs of the fowl, together with the waste 
brought back from the tissues by the circulatory system, is voided 
as droppings. The maximum of heat production, which began 
with the taking of food into the body, occurs some six or eight 
hours after the meal. The activity of the organs of the body, mus- 
cular activity, building up and breaking down of the tissues, all 
contribute their share to heat production. 

Heat is lost to the body in a variety of ways. Some is carried 



FOR SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA 87 

off in the exhaled breath and in the droppings, and some disposed of 
by radiation from the surface of the body. Too rapid loss of heat 
is provided against by insulation of the body with fat and by cloth- 
ing in the shape of feathers. Throughout the life of a healthy fowl 
this heat expenditure is under the control of a delicate system of 
regulation, a part of the nervous system. These heat regulator 
nerves control the rapidity with which heat is expended, and have 
power to excite heat production and so maintain the bodily tem- 
perature at a proper degree. Whether the heat production within 
the body be rapid or slow, the body temperature remains about the 
same all the time controlled by the regulator. The above only 
covers the subject roughly, but probably as fully as the average 
reader will find patience to consider. 

The fowl, if permitted to range and find its own food, will live 
chiefly on grains and seeds, will drink freely of water, eat quantities 
of green food when available, and consume a considerable propor- 
tion of animal food in the shape of bugs and worms and any waste 
meat it can find. The nutritive ratio of such a ration must vary 
widely. Yet if the bird is on a large farm, has decent sleeping 
quarters and an occasional feed of corn on the ear, it visually does 
remarkably well, all things considered. Hen farmers who make a 
fair living out of poultry often let the fowls balance their own 
rations and keep boxes of corn, oats, and meat scrap always before 
the birds. Oftentimes these birds do quite as well as those fed in 
a "scientific" manner. Why? T don't know, but I think that the 
presiding life within the fowl, which dominates its nervous system 
and impels it to do certain things, is responsible for the success of 
the fowl left to its own inclinations. Where things do not go as they 
should some morbid condition has interfered with the normal con- 
duct of the living organism. 

So far as balancing a ration goes, I think that there has been 
and is a great deal of nonsense connected with it. Rations which 
vary widely in nutritive ratio are giving equally good results in the 
hands of different poultry keepers. It is undoubtedly wise to 
roughly balance a ration by offsetting a heavy supply of carbon- 
aceous food with some nitrogenous matter, or vice versa. I know 
it is not necessary to provide elaborate mashes with a multitude of 
ingredients. So far as is possible it is undoubtedly the safest plan 
to observe the flock carefully, note the work done, and try to feed 
according to what seems to be the immediate need. Let the ap- 



88 A PRACTICAL POULTRY PLANT 

petite and inclination of the flock as a whole, combined with the 
work it is doing, be the guide to the make-up of the ration. The 
ratio may fluctuate from i :3 to i :g, with an averagt about i :6, and 
the results prove excellent. It isn't necessary to sit down and 
figure it out. If you observe the flock carefully as a complete whole, 
made up of individuals, and take notice of the effect of what you 
feed, and the behavior of the birds, you will learn what foods and 
feeding methods are best suited to your needs. 

Supply good sound grains, some cooked mash by way of vari- 
ety, a liberal supply of fresh green food (in summer the best way 
to supply it is to provide a clean grass run), and some meat food. 
Make grain the staple food and the others side dishes or relishes. 
Avoid too much sameness in the daily feeding. Provide grit, shell 
and charcoal for the fowls to eat as they please. Watch the condi- 
tion of the fowls carefully, try to keep them well fed, active and in 
good laying or breeding condition. The droppings should be of 
sufficient consistency to hold their shape, but should not be too 
solid. In color they should be dark tapering off into grayish and 
white. If the droppings are watery and dark with red splashes of 
mucus in them feed less meat food. If droppings are soft or pasty 
and yellowish or brownish, feed more meat and less starchy food. 
Greenish watery diarrhoea should always lead to a careful investi- 
gation of the sanitary conditions and the condition of the food and 
water. It is a danger signal. 

Exercise and fresh air are important to the proper assimilation 
of food for best results from layers or breeders. Exercise prevents 
misappropriation of food and the laying on of too much fat. A diet 
that with exercise proves excellent for egg production will, if the 
fowl be prevented from exercising, prove fattening. If you feed 
a diet rich in protein, and neglect to provide for exercise, you sim- 
ply pay for high priced food to produce fat which can be more 
cheaply produced by feeding fatty food. 

No rule for feeding can be given that will fit all conditions and 
give like good results for all flocks if followed blindly. In an ar- 
ticle like this the writer has no choice but to give the salient points 
as well boiled down as possible. So far as the practical application 
goes each reader must read, digest and apply the matter as fits his 
own particular case and as it appeals to his common sense. 

DR. WOODS. 



FOK SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA 89 

CHAPTER XIV. 



THE WATER SUPPLY 

If sufificient water can be obtained by digging a well, it will be 
cheaper, in the long run, to own your water supply than to buy it. 
If bought i^; is generally sold by meter measurement at from fifteen 
to twenty-five cents per thousand gallons ; and when one uses two 
or three thousand gallons a day for eight or nine months of the 
year, it means a rather big bill. 

If water has to be got by boring a well several hundred feet, 
and by no other way, I should prefer to look elsewhere for land. 
A bored well is expensive to bore and case, and is liable to get sand 
in it. Besides, a deep well means heavier machinery to pump the 
water. 

If a dug well is decided on, care must be exercised when select- 
ing the man to do it. Many wells are dug and cased in a manner 
simply disgraceful. I have seen some work done in well digging 
that cost twice as much as necessary, and the wells were poor af- 
fairs throughout ; so see that the so-called "well digger" is not 
making his maiden attempt at your expense. 

I have had two wells dug and set up with complete pumping 
outfits ; and after five years' service, I am satisfied with them in 
every respect. I will describe the last one. 

Before digging I inquired around to find out the man who had 
dug the most successful wells in the valley. Then I got him to go 
over my place and, taking into account the general contour of the 
country, and localities of other wells, to tell me where, in his opin- 
ion, was the most likely place to get water. Having settled this 
point, I arranged with him for digging my well, which was to be 
six feet square. He was to dig the well and lay the casing for $3 
a foot for the first thirty feet, and $4 a foot for the next thirty feet. 
I was to supply the casing, which was 2"xi2" redwood, costing, 
with corner pieces, about $1.25 for every foot cased. 

The digging was pretty hard, being clay and boulders for 
twenty feet ; many of the boulders were so big that they had to be 
blasted. My digger employed a man, boy and horse. After the 
first few feet, which could be thrown out, a small derrick was rigged 
over the hole, with a block and fall attached to it. A dirt bucket 
was made fast to one end of the fall and the horse at the other end. 



90 A PRACTICAL POULTKY PLANT 

which led through a lead block fastened to the foot of the derrick. 
When the bucket was full the horse, led by the boy, hoisted it, and 
the man on top tipped it on the dump pile. I found this system of 
hoisting far preferable to a hand windlass or a small hoisting 
engine, for a well of moderate depth. 

As the well went down it was cased, so all dangers of a cave-in 
were avoided. At twenty feet water gravel was struck, which 
grew moister with increasing depth-, until at twenty-five feet a foot 
of water would accumulate in an hour. By the time the thirty foot 
level was reached they w^ere hoisting one bucket of dirt and two of 
water, so a common jig pump was installed and a boy put on to 
pump. This kept the well dry, and it was then found that the water 
gravel ended at thirty feet, and clay was encountered again. A 
sump was then sunk eight feet in the clay, and a platform made 
over it at the thirty foot level. The water then drained into the 
sump, which when full was pumped out. We found that we had 
fifteen hundred gallons in twenty-four hours, and as this was in 
August we reckoned that this would be our summer supply. (Al- 
ways dig your well in the middle or towards the end of the dry 
season, to be sure of knowing what the lowest supply will be). 

I went down with the well digger, and we made a careful ex- 
amination of the water gravel and found that the water came from 
a northeasterly direction. I then decided to run a tunnel south- 
east through the gravel and cut the little water streams at right 
angles. The tunnel was started at the thirty foot level, where the 
gravel ended and the clay began, and was four feet wide by seven 
high, and well timbered from the entrance, to prevent caving. The 
timbers were 4"x6" redwood. 

Frames 4x7 feet were made of these timbers, mitered at the 
joints, and placed every four feet in the tunnel. Behind and over 
the frames was put 2"xi2" redwood casing. This made a solid 
sheathing on both sides and top. The level of the floor was up- 
lifted from the entrance about one foot in fifty, which gave ample 
drainage. When the tunnel had been run in forty feet the fifteen 
hundred gallons a day had been increased to six thousand, which 
was all the water that we required. Lately, I went through the 
tunnel and found it in perfect order, not a timber started and the 
wood in good condition. There are several ways of casing a well, 
but I prefer this style (Fig. 32), as I think it not only the best, but 
the easiest to cut and place. 



FOR SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA 



91 













The well when finished cost as follows : 

Digging, 30 feet @ $3 per foot $ 90 

Digging, 48 feet @ $4 per foot 192 

Casing lumber 75 

Timbering 10 

Spikes 3 

$370 

The engine house is built over the well, with 10x14 feet floor 
space, and has a good light trap in the floor to prevent rats, etc., 
from tumbling into the water. This house is very plain, just a 
frame, and cost $100. 

I looked about a good deal before deciding on an engine and 
pump. I finally decided on a 3-horse power "Lambert" gasoline 
engine, and have been so well satisfied with it, that lately I have 
installed another and smaller one of the same make at another well. 



92 A PRACTICAL POULTRY PLANT 

Witli ordinary care, these little engines will start at the first turn 
of the crank and keep running as long as the gasoline or distillate 
lasts. Once a week they are cleaned, and once a year, during the 
rainy season, I overhaul them, take up any lost motion, and get 
them in good order again for the irrigating season. 

In buying an engine it is wise policy to get a make that has an 
agency near by, and that is generally used in your section, so that 
in case of repairs, or a new part wanted, no time need be lost by 
having to send east. 

Instead of a patent pump, I got an engineer to make me a com- 
mon, old fashioned walking beam, and put a double action 4" pump 
cylinder at one end of the beam and geared the other end to the en- 
gine. This style of pump and gearing is easily kept in order. A 
small trap over the pump in the roof of the engine house allows the 
pump and rod to be hoisted through it in case of repairs. The 
walking beam means a good deal of power with a very small engine. 
My engine never carries more than half her load, and yet pumps 
three thousand gallons an hour with a consumption of six cents' 
worth of distillate. The engine, pump and walking beam complete, 
set up and ready to run, cost $340. 

A six thousand gallon galvanized iron tank, set on a frame 
twenty feet above the ground, cost $120. The tank is ten feet high, 
and when full gives fifteen pounds pressure to the square inch, 
falling to ten pounds when nearly empty. I find this pressure 
sufficient for all requirements. 

A tank made of No. 18 galvanized iron will last twenty years 
or more with proper care, and is, in my opinion, preferable to wood 
for many reasons. 

The usual practice is to pitch the inside of the tank, but I find 
this a mistake ; the tank is distended when full and contracted when 
empty, and these motions tend to crack ofif the pitch and leave bare 
iron, which, in turn, rusts, although galvanized; so that in a very 
few years leaks occur. 

The best plan is to have a "union" close to the tank on the in- 
let pipe, and another on the outlet pipe, and after getting the tank 
in its place on top of the tower, block it up a couple of feet and give 
both inside and outside two coats of red lead, allowing a week or 
ten days between each coat. Personally see that the paint fills 
every crack and corner, especially around the rivet heads, and 
joints of the plates. When thoroughly hard, lov/er the tank and 
connect the piping. 



FOR SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA 



93 



The "unions" will make this an easy thing to do every year; 
but only one coat will be necessary after the first time ; and if a 
warm day is selected the tank can be emptied, cleaned, dried and 
painted in one day, and filled again the next morning. 

In getting piping, always get "dipped" pipe ; that is, pipe that 
has been dipped in hot tar. It will cost from half to one cent a foot 
more than black pipe, but the tar preserves the iron, and the pipe 
will last a great deal longer and be less liable to choke up with rust. 
A glance at the "general chart" of the place shows the system of 
piping that I use, and, as far as size of pipes is concerned, applies 
only to where the water comes from your own tank, which means 




I / 



"<^^ 



U- 






> 'S=» ~V *Ws \^ i>s o >? t^ 



-\MM/^^^ 



>/ 



I V>^y>e. 



r 



FIG. 33 



a limited or low pressure ; but where it comes from an outside water 
service the pressure should be great enough for the use of three- 
quarter inch pipe all over the place. 

A good deal of the water pressure is lost by the friction of the 
water running through the pipes ; the smaller the pipe, the greater 
the friction. To obviate this as much as possible, I use lyz" pipe 
from the tank to the laAvn where the greatest pressure is required 
for sprinkling; and from this lyz" pipe I use parallel lengths of i" 
pipe, about eighteen feet apart. These i" pipes go through the 
lawn, and have a three-quarter inch nipple about a foot long every 
eighteen feet. Each nipple has a cap, which when I sprinkle, is taken 
off and a square sprinkler screwed in its place (Fig. 33). I generally 



94 A PKACTICAL POULTRY PLANT 

have three sprinklers going at once, each spray overlapping the 
other. I find this a much cheaper and better way than having two 
or three hydrants on the lawn and using a rubber hose, that costs 
from fifteen to twenty cents a foot, and has to be carted around 
every time the sprinklers require shifting. Besides, a lawn sprink- 
led with hose and a circular sprinkler has to have a good deal of 
hand sprinkling done, where the sprinklers have not reached. By 
the method that I use, one has only to screw on the three square 
sprinklers in a line, and open the valves. At the end of an hour a 
strip of lawn, about eighteen feet wide and fifty-four feet long, will 
have been thoroughly and evenly sprayed with about fifteen or 
eighteen hundred gallons of water. I find that each sprinkler uses 
from five to six hundred gallons an hour. When shifting, one has 
only to close the valve, unscrew the sprinklers and put on the caps, 
then take ofif the caps of three more nipples, screw on the sprink- 
lers, and open the valve — about five minutes' work — and no worry 
about seeing if the sprinklers are in the right place. Of course, the 
nipples sticking up all over the lawn do not improve the looks of it ; 
but if they are nine inches under the ground and only three inches 
above it, they do not look so very bad. Care must be taken when 
mowing to avoid running into them with the mower. If one hap- 
pens to have a careless man it is easy to stick a stake in the ground 
alongside of each nipple until the mowing is finished; this will jog 
his memory. 

I use one-inch pipe, with three-quarter inch hydrants, in the 
orchard and kitchen garden, where a good deal of water is required 
for irrigating ; but for the rest of the plant, three-quarter inch pipe 
is all that is required. 

The General Chart shows a good deal of piping and a great 
many faucets ; but one must remember that there is no time to 
waste in carrying water. In buying the pipe, watch a chance for a 
low market ; the usual price is about five cents a foot for three- 
quarter inch dipped pipe, eight for one inch, and twelve for inch 
and a half, but the market varies a good deal, sometimes going be- 
low these figures, and again, rising above them. The faucets or 
bibbs are about sixty cents each when bought by the dozen. Get 
your own tools for fitting and laying the pipe ; a set consisting of 
pipe-vice, pipe-cutter, two pipe tongs or pipe wrenches, and a box 
of dies, will cost from $25 to $30, and by doing your own work 
quite a saving will be effected. The work is pleasant, and very 



FOR SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA 95 

simple to learn ; in fact it is necessary to know how to fit piping and 
to have a few tools, for a broken or leaky pipe is a common occur- 
rence where much piping is used. When connecting pipes, use 
graphite mixed with oil, instead of red lead ; it is much easier for 
disconnecting, as red lead gets very hard. 

I use a square sprayer called the "California Square Sprinkler," 
it is the only square one that I know of, and is, I believe, no longer 
made. I am making one on a plan of my own, and if it proves bet- 
ter than the ones I am using, I will put it on the market. 



96 A PRACTICAL POULTRY PLANT 

CHAPTER XV. 



ORCHARD, GARDEN, LAWN, ETC. 

In each hen yard are planted a couple of pepper trees, which 
grow fast and afiford a fine shelter both for sun and rain. I have 
some four years old that are twenty feet from side to side and quite 
twenty feet high. For the first year or two they will require a few 
buckets of water during each of the hot months ; after that, the 
roots will be deep enough to do without irrigation. 

Gophers are fond of young peppers, and soon kill them by 
eating the root. I circumvent them by buying the little trees in 
quart tins, and then getting some empty five gallon oil cans, I 
knock out the bottoms and lay two narrow pieces of shake where 
the bottom was, fill up with soil, take the peppers out of the quart 
tins, and plant them in the oil tins. I then dig my hole and plant 
the tin, keeping an inch of it above the ground. By the time the 
tin has rusted to pieces the roots will be big enough to withstand 
the gophers. Before transplanting the peppers from the small to 
the large tins, water the soil well, and then cut the can down the 
side and spread it open ; the plant can then be taken out without 
disturbing the roots. 

Some people will naturally say, "Why not plant fruit trees in 
the yards instead of peppers?" Well, there are two reasons. One 
is, that fowls make the trees and fruit very dirty. But a more im- 
portant one is that fruit trees, laden with ripe fruit, are a strong 
temptation to boys, who might easily cut the fence at night to get 
at the fruit. The fowls are not so easily got at ; they are locked in, 
and besides, are liable to make enough noise, when tampered with, 
to arouse a self-respecting watch dog. 

I have a small home orchard which cost me a good deal to 
plant ; but the way the trees have grown more than repays me for 
all the trouble and expense. The soil is only about twelve inches 
deep ; under that is seven feet of hardpan, and under that, water 
gravel. I knew that if I planted on top of the hardpan, the roots, 
being unable to penetrate it, would spread through the shallow soil 
and require constant irrigation, and, at the end of a few years, peg 
out for want of nourishment. 

I therefore dug a hole for each tree, from six to eight feet in 
diameter, and four or five feet deep ; from the bottom of this a hole 
was drilled through the remaining hard pan into the gravel, and a 



FOR SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA 97 

couple of sticks of giant powder tamped into the drill holes and 
exploded, thus breaking up the hardpan into small pieces. The 
hole was then tested by running water into it, and if it drained out 
quickly, I knew that it was all right. A wheelbarrow load of sand 
was then dumped into the hole and spread over the bottom to pre- 
vent the hardpan from caking again, and the hole filled up with 
good soil. 

When finished, these holes had cost me about a dollar and a 
half each, so, naturally, I spared no expense to get first class trees, 
true to name, to put into them. Mr. Luther Burbank kindly ad- 
vised me in selecting some of the varieties of trees likely to do well 
in my locality, and the balance I selected myself through Profes- 
sor Wickson's "California Fruits." This book, and "Vegetables," 
by the same author, have proved of the greatest service to me. I 
raise nearly all the fruit the family requires, and have a greater 
variety than I can get in the local market ; no bought fruit has, for 
me, quite the same taste as the fruit I raise and pick myself. I irri- 
gate four times during the summer, but hope that in another year 
or two the tap roots of my trees will have grown down into the 
water gravel, and so be able to help themselves to what they need, 
and save me the necessity of irrigating. 

I find the following fruits do well in this locality, oranges, 
lemons, grape fruit, loquats (large variety), peaches nectarines, 
apricots, apples, pears, figs, plums, and persimmons. I have several 
varieties of each of these fruits. There is also a small vineyard, 
and a berry patch, with blackberries, raspberries, Logan berries 
and guavas, all of which have done well. 

I must not forget to mention the kitchen garden, which gives 
us all the vegetables we can use, and more. It is no fancy of mind to 
say that our vegetables are better than anything we can buy, for ev- 
ery one knows that stale vegetables can not possibly compare with 
those gathered just before using. A dozen beds fifty feet long by 
four wide, will, with very little labor keep the average family well 
supplied all through the year. I find it a good plan to have a cold 
frame, covered with cheese cloth, for sowing the seeds of plants 
that can be transplanted, as it protects the young plants from their 
enemies the birds, and from the too friendly sun. 

The best way to plant the beds is as follows : After the ground 
has been dug and raked, sow the seed and then cover the whole 
bed with a layer of well rotted stable manure, an inch deep (chicken 
manure is too strong). This can be sprayed with a hose a couple of 



98 A PRACTICAL POULTKY PLANT 

times a week, as the manure mulch keeps the ground from drying 
out and caking; in fact, the ground will keep in perfect order until 
the end of the crop, even through the hottest weather. No hoeing 
will be necessary, and the weeds are better pulled out than hoed. 
When the crop is finished, the mulch can be dug in and the new 
crop planted without digging in fresh manure. Follow a root crop, 
such as carrots or onions, with a leaf crop, as rotation of crops is 
good for the soil, and gives the best results. Keep a compost heap 
of stable manure ripening all the time for the kitchen garden. For 
the orchard I use chicken manure once a year. 

I irrigate the berries by making a large basin around each bush 
at the end of the spring rains and filling it with mulch ; when they 
are watered these basins are filled and left. This plan conserves 
the moisture and does away with hoeing. Give them plenty of 
water during the growing and bearing season. 

In starting- the lawn, sow it to grain, such as oats or barlev, 
with the first rain, and before the crop ripens, cut it, to prevent 
any grains from falling and coming up later. In March prepare the 
ground and get it as level as possible; then sow to white clover, 
rake in the seed, and give the ground a thorough rolling. It can 
then be sprinkled with screened stable manure and rolled again. 

The object of first sowing a grain crop is to firm the ground, 
and to kill out the weeds. If there is no rain for a few weeks after 
sowing the seed, be sure to turn on the sprayers before the ground 
dries out too much. The screened manure will act as a mulch and 
retain the moisture to a certain extent ; but do not trust too much 
to it, especially when you have your irrigating system in readiness. 
The principal thing in lawn making is getting the ground level 
and firm, so that the lawn mower will cut the clover evenly, and 
leave a smooth surface. Well firmed soil is most necessary, too, 
for the sprouting of the seed, for loose soil does not give it the 
needful moisture. I believe that half the trouble of seed not coming 
up in garden and lawn can be laid to this cause. 

I am aware that this chapter does not strictly apply to the 
working of the "Practical Poultry Plant," and will be an old story 
to some of my readers ; but there may be others who, like myself, 
come from very different occupations and physical conditions, and 
enter a new field, feeling in the dark as to the best method of pro- 
cedure. Six years ago I would have been glad of these suggestions, 
and the memory of my own lack of knowledge at the start leads me 
to offer them to others who are equally inexperienced. 



FOR SOUTHEKN CAI.IFORNIA 99 



CHAPTER XVI. 



FANCY STOCK 

The profits that I have mentioned so far, are entirely from 
market eggs. The birds that lay these eggs are all thoroughbreds, 
but are unmated, and the eggs unfertile and sold at market prices. 
I particularly want to impress this point, that for the first few years 
a beginner had better look to the egg market for his principal 
source of income, and then, if he cares to, gradually work into the 
fancy business, which means raising standard stock and eggs for 
setting, at fancy prices. It also means steady advertising, and ex- 
hibiting and winning prizes at the poultry shows. 

After having decided on the particular breed or breeds that 
you are going to raise, eggs or stock must be bought from one of 
the best known breeders in the country, at pretty stiff prices. I 
bought eggs at $5 a setting, and if I got one or two first class birds 
from each setting, I was satisfied. In this way I have now some 
■fine birds, and each year sell more stock and settings. 

T do not exhibit, and do not intend to, as I find nearly all my 
time is required on my place ; and my principal vocation at present 
is making a success of commercial poultry and market eggs, the 
fancy branch being entirely a side issue. 

An amusing incident happened a few years ago in the town 
near which I live. A stock and poultry show was held there, and 
afterwards I was asked why I had not exhibited. On replying that 
I had been too busy either to exhibit or to attend the show, my 
questioner, who happened to be the owner of one of the meat mar- 
kets, replied: "Why, I was the poultry judge, and I am sure that 
you would have taken some prizes ; the birds that I awarded prizes 
to were much smaller and lighter than your birds, and hadn't much 
meat on the breast ; between you and me, they were poor table 
birds." I said, 'T thought it was an exhibit of fancy poultry." He 
replied, dubiously, "Yes, I suppose it was, but you see I am more 
used to judging a bird by its meat than its feathers!" 

Please don't accept this 3^arn as being typical of the ordinary 
poultry show. 

I find that for family use the heavier breeds are preferable in 
many ways to the light ones. They mature more slowly, and do 



100 A PRACTICAL POULTRY PLANT 

not get so tough and stringy as the Leghorns. If the cockerels are 
kept separate from the hens they are good roasters even when a 
year old, whereas the Leghorns begin to toughen at six months. 

The Plymouth Rocks, Light Brahmas and Bufif Orpingtons are 
all good table birds, but the last named breed is by far the choicest, 
being finer grained and more juicy than the other two. They all 
lay as well as the Leghorns, with the advantage of being better 
winter layers. Indeed, even through their moult they lay eggs 
enough to pay their expenses ; but they have to be kept in small 
flocks of fifteen to twenty-five, to get the best results. 



FOK SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA 101 

CHAPTER XVII. 

THE SEPTIC TANK 

One of the serious problems of country life is the disposal of 
sewage. It bothered me a good deal, up to a few months ago, when 
a friend gave me a paper from which the following is taken. 

I built a tank of brick, first putting in a concrete foundation 
fully six inches deep, and cemented the tank both outside and in- 
side. I also put in a length of vitrified pipe at the bottom of the 
first tank, sloping the floor toward it, so that every thing would 
drain out. This pipe was then plugged and the plug made air tight. 
When the time for cleaning comes, instead of taking off the roof 
of the tank and baling it out, I shall draw the plug and poke the 
hose, with a strong pressure of water, through the plughole. I 
used for the roof 3"xi2" redwood, seasoned and tarred twice before 
placing, and then made all air tight with a heavy coat of cement. 
Two or three sacks of common charcoal in the filter is better than 
sand or gravel. The tank cost me exactly $ioo, and I consider it 
the best investment I ever made. 

Disposal of Sewage on the Farm. 

At many country homes where it is desired to introduce 
modern improvements in the way of waterworks to supply bath 
room, closet, sink and laundry, the disposal of sewage is quite a 
serious problem. 

Fortunately it is a problem quite easy' of solution by the "Septic 
Tank" system at once scientific and simple though but little known. 
The system can be easily applied in any place where sufficient fall 
can be secured to carry away the sewage. It is inexpensive, ab- 
solutely automatic and thoroughly efifective and satisfactory. It 
can perhaps be best illustrated by describing a plant now in opera- 
tion at the Western Hospital for the insane at Watertown, 111. The 
system is the result of an accidental discovery, and was first put in 
successful practice by Dr. W. E. Taylor, superintendent of the 
above named institution though now being installed at other public 
institutions in Illinois and attracting much attention elsewhere. 
That it is perfect in its action may be gathered from tlv" fact that it 
receives all the concentrated sewage from an institution whose in- 
mates and employes number nearly eight hundred people, thor- 



102 A PKACTICAL POULTRY PLANT 

oughly and completely disposes of all organic, effete and poisonous 
matter with no residuum or deposit, and the product flows away in 
a clear, sparkling stream of water, ninety-eight per cent pure by 
chemical analysis when it strikes the air, the remaining two per cent 
of impurities being liberated upon exposure to the atmosphere, 
leaving a stream of clear water pure enough for any purpose what- 
ever. That this sewage can enter at one end of a tank a foul, offen- 
sive stream reeking with filth, and emerge from thf other end a 
limpid stream of water actually pure enough to drink, seems wholly 
incredible, and yet such, is thfe case and the wonder of it all is that 
it cleanses itself automatically, without any artificial agency, solely 
through the work of the filth bacteria preying upon each other. 
This system works continually, summer and winter, year in and 
year out, with absolutely no attention and without change in any 
season, never freezing. It is practically adapted to use in the 
country at a distance from city sewers, and even for the use of 
towns and cities is entirely reliable and eff'ective. 

At the Watertown Asylum the system consists of two oblong 
tanks of seventy thousand gallons capacity each, placed side by 
side, one tank emptying into the other through a pipe. For all 
practical purposes, however, one tank with a weir box at one end, 
is exactly as good as two tanks, as it has been found that the water 
as it emerges from the first tank is just as pure as after it has passed 
through the second tank. The object of this weir box is to check 
the overflow and prevent any agitation of the sewage in the tank. 

The tanks in this system are located about a quarter of a mile 
from the buildings. They might be located forty feet or four miles 
away, according to convenience, the result would be the same. 

The sewage tank as shown in the illustration, consists of a 
brick box with eight-inch walls and floor, lined within and without 
with cement. Concrete would make a better tank. The roof is 
made air tight with a heavy coating of pitch and all crevices are 
tightly sealed with the same material. The sewer inlet is about 
two feet below the surface of the sewage in the tank. A short dis- 
tance from the opposite end of the tank a cross wall is built, having 
a narrow opening extending across the tank on a level with the 
inlet. This opening has little if any greater capacity than the inlet. 
Such an opening causes less current in discharging than would a 
circular opening. In the end wall is a row of curved tile so placed 
that the outlets are two feet above the sewer inlet and the opening 



FOR SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA 



103 



in the cross wall. The cross wall forms a weir, or dam, which re- 
tards the outflow from the main tank, and of course there can be 
no discharge until the contents of the tank and weir box reach the 
level of the curved tile outlets. Thus both inlet and outlet are sub- 
merged about two feet below the surface of the sewage in the tank. 
The filter box is filled with sand and gravel and has an outlet at the 
bottom through which the water finally discharges. 

The operation of this system is simplicity simplified. The 
sewage entering the tank remains until it fills the tank and the 
weir box to a level with the overflow from the curved tile outlets. 
In twenty-four hours or a little over, after entering the tank a scum 
will have formed on the surface, an inch or more in thickness, con- 
sisting of a solid mass of filth bacteria, which prey upon the poison- 
ous matter and the solids contained in the sewage, constantly fight- 
ing among themselves and destroying each other like the Kilkenny 



-^^--^^ 




SEPTIC TANK SEWAGE SYSTEM. 



cats, which devoured each other until nothing was left but the tail, 
the tail in this case being represented by the two per cent of poison- 
ous matter left in the water as it escapes, and which is at once elimi- 
nated upon exposure to the atmosphere. 

Light and air are fatal to these bacteria, hence the necessity 
of keeping them in a dark, air tight place that they may accomplish 
their work. For this reason the tank must be air tight. Again to 
do their work effectively they must be left in perfect quiet, hence 
the inlet and outlet are submerged below the surface in order that 
from inflow and outflow as little current as possible may be caused, 
and this quiet is further assured by means of the weir box. 

Upon emerging from the tiles the water is clear as crystal, and 
by chemical analysis contains but two per cent of bacteria that 
would be in the slightest degree injurious to the human system. 



104 A PRACTICAL POULTRY PLANT 

This water is allowed to filter through the sand and gravel, its ex- 
posure in this manner to the air destroying all remaining bacteria, 
so that it emerges from the final outlet absolutely pure. 

Knowing its source, one would not care to drink it, though it 
is pure enough for this purpose, and stock may drink it with per- 
fect safety. 

A system of this kind will not freeze in winter, as the gases 
arising from the sewage in the tank generate enough heat to coun- 
teract the cold and prevent freezing. The water as it emerges will 
be found much warmer than the air in cold weather. 

In cases where the sewage discharge is scanty and intermit- 
tent there might be danger of the water freezing in the filter box 
during a long cold spell, and then it would be advisable to erect a 
small tight building, well protected from frost, over the whole 
outfit, including both tank and filter, but when the sewer is in con- 
stant use this would be unnecessary. 

The secret, if secret it may be called, of the whole system is 
the dark and air tight tank, the submerged inlet and submerged 
outlet, and that is all there is to it. The bacteria will do their 
work if let alone. If stirred up they refuse to perform as desired. 
When properly working the tank might be opened, the bottom 
scraped and not a handful of solid matter could be found. 

The tank should be large enough to hold all the sewage that is 
ever likely to run into it within a period of twenty-four to thirty-six 
hours. For a private residence this would rarely need to be larger 
than three feet wide, six feet deep and eight to ten feet long. 



FOR SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA 105 



SUMMARY OF EXPENSES 

Land, 5 acres @ $200 per acre $1000 

Store House 230 

No. I Brood House 200 

No. 2 Brood House, containing incubator and feed rooms. .. 240 

12 inside sections of Brood House 12 

12 Brood House yards 70 

2 Cyphers' 360-egg Incubators 80 

12 Brooders . . . . : 120 

12 Chicken Houses 120 

12 Chicken Yards and fixtures 133 

12 Hen Houses, complete 780 

12 Double Hen Yards and fixtures 430 

2 Compost Houses, with sand boxes 10 

2500 feet ^-inch Dipped Pipe @ 5c per foot 125 

2 dozen Faucets, or bibbs 14 

Set of Piping Tools 25 

2 Post-Hole Diggers and Wire Stretchers 10 

Carpenter's Tools, etc 5^ 

Labor, 6 months @ $50 per month 300 

Stock, or Eggs, Feed, etc 55° 

Complete Plant $4500 



JUN i 1905 



1-s^ , ,H,>^- . ^i'lllsliiA^ 




